FARMINGTON – Meeting via a teleconference call, county commissioners and other officials discussed how the novel coronavirus would impact county operations moving forward and approved a contingency plan for the Franklin County Regional Communications Center.
Franklin County Emergency Management Agency Director Tim Hardy said that dispatchers at the center had come together to develop a continuity of operations plan. If it was to be deemed necessary that dispatchers shelter in place, Hardy said, teams of four dispatchers would work for two week rotations. Hardy noted that commissioners would be alerted if it was necessary to implement the plan, while County Clerk Julie Magoon said that she had contacted the union to see if there were any issues.
Using roll call-style votes over the phone, the commissioners unanimously supported the plan.
Sheriff Scott Nichols said that he had asked local law enforcement to hold off on arrests except for cases of domestic violence, sex crimes and other major crimes in a bid to cut down traffic in and out of Franklin County Detention Center.
“Everything else, we’re asking for them to issue summons, or arrest with [personal recognizance] bail,” Nichols said, noting that local agencies were “cooperating fantastically” with that request. “That’s been helpful keeping stuff out of the jail.”
Nichols has also been working to address other possible issues that could arise, including issuing a public request for personal protective gear for staff treating inmates that might have COVID-19. He said he’s received disposable gowns, face shields, gloves and masks as a result of that request. He’s also been talking to Sodexo, the company that provides food to the University of Maine at Farmington, to ensure he can feed prisoners if the jail loses access to its kitchen staff.
Nichols said that he was also looking into temporary lodging for employees, should a situation arise where an employee didn’t want to go home and potentially risk spreading the virus to his or her family.
Turning to the budget process, Magoon recommended that department heads, commissioners and budget committee members utilize phone conferencing to review the 2020-2021 budget.
“We’re trying to limit foot traffic here at the courthouse and at all of our facilities,” Magoon said.
Magoon said that she would be talking with Josh Bell, the Farmington Board of Selectmen and Budget Committee chair, about the conducting the annual caucus that places selectmen on the committee.
Commissioners also unanimously approved opting out of paid leave and expanded medical leave elements included within the recently-approved federal coronavirus relief bill for the county’s emergency responders. Nichols, Hardy and Magoon met on the issue and thought that was the best way to proceed. While Nichols said that he would support employees that got sick, he was concerned about the potential of an employee vacationing to a location where the virus was prevalent, knowing they would automatically receive weeks of guaranteed paid leave upon returning.
Commissioner Charlie Webster of Farmington agreed, saying that he wanted to help county employees but that it should be on a case-by-case basis. The commissioners’ decision only applies to the county’s emergency responders, not other employees.
In other business, commissioners approved contracting with RHR Smith for the next four years. RHR Smith, the county’s previous auditor, was more than $20,000 less expensive that the second bid the county received, coming in at $38,000.
If we have a Franklin County budget issue and we really want to save tax payer dollars going forward, why can’t we operate in a way that always reduces unnecessary traffic into the County Jail? It seems that the jail budget is costing all taxpayers dearly?
Seems like a reasonable question for the Commissioners to be asking.
From article above:
Sheriff Scott Nichols said that he had asked local law enforcement to hold off on arrests except for cases of domestic violence, sex crimes and other major crimes in a bid to cut down traffic in and out of Franklin County Detention Center.
“Everything else, we’re asking for them to issue summons, or arrest with [personal recognizance] bail,” Nichols said, noting that local agencies were “cooperating fantastically” with that request. “That’s been helpful keeping stuff out of the jail.”
Thank you Daily Bulldog for the information. The Commission minutes are woefully out of date and the DB continues to provide valued information to the citizens of Franklin County on their government at the County level.
Bill I think the sheriff is trying to cut back on inmates because of the coronavirus , not because of the budget
Another great decision and just what the county needs: opting out of paid leave and medical leave for first responders. Because people in essential jobs can’t just stay home when they’re sick anyway and so why bother? Or is the goal to ensure that Franklin County first responders now also get to be in the frontlines of spreading the virus?
Anyway, please remember in November that once again our commissioners decided not to put the good of the county first but again chose making people be off worse in the long run just to save a penny now.
The Sheriff has done an exceptional job with trying to keep the Jail Budget manageable. One of the problems we face as Commissioners with the Sheriff is continuing mandates from the Department of Corrections. I’ll give an example of two that cost the County property taxpayers in excess of $25,000 annually. As long as anyone can remember the jail’s cook prepared daily hot meals and additional meals on Friday for the weekend. These meals were refrigerated to be warmed up and feed to the prisoners on Saturday and Sunday. ( I remember when Sheriff French’s wife did so in the late 70’s and early 1980’s ) The Department of Corrections passed a regulation mandating that no meal may be served to a prisoner that is over eight hours old. The next year DOC mandated that nursing professionals employed by the County could no longer leave oral medications to be administered by the Jail Officers, over the weekend. Obviously the medication was labelled with the prisoners name and locked in safe storage. Thus, the property taxpayers of Franklin County foot the bill and were forced to hire two additional part time workers. These are just two examples of the difficulty we are faced with while attempting to keep property taxes under control and affordable for County taxpayers. Sheriff Nichols and his administration have worked well with the Commissioners regarding his expenditures and I believe has done an admirable job. With out question we need to continue to strive to keep the budget under control, and the need to continue to scrutinize spending must remain of concern to not only the County Commissioners but all elected officials serving in County Government.
I’m just wondering why you would need 2 PT staff just to administer medications. In some public institutions such as schools the faculty and staff can be trained to administer medications to underage students. This one hour of free training saves the district nurse time and energy so they don’t have to be at every school to give every med. This also saves the local taxpayer by not hiring a school nurse for every building. Why would jails be any different? I tried to find out more about this and found several jail staff chats that talk about a nurse packaging meds 24 hours in advance in sealed envelopes allowing certified corrections officers to administer meds to inmates. Seems like if a teacher or office admin assistant can be easily certified to give a child meds then an officer can be easily trained to give incarcerated adults meds. What year was this changed?
Sam, One part time employee to prepare hot food on the weekend. One part time licensed health care professional to administer medication, as required by Department of Corrections. The jail personnel are not licensed as nurses or health care professionals and are not allowed to administer medication. The Commissioners considered other options such as training jail officers but were advised that even if allowed by DOC, the liability concerns out weigh the cost savings.