At the Tuesday Monroe County Prison Board meeting, Commissioner John Moyer, chairman of the prison board, asked Marlo Merhige, Monroe County Controller and prison board secretary, how the new year is going.

“So in January, the first of the year, only 7% of budget. The wages I have a two-day accrual that needs to be posted yet. I’m estimating with the two-day accrual we’re going to be about $97,000 greater than last year for wages. I didn’t even estimate the overtime because it just fluctuates so much,” she said. “Jan. 15, it was $65,093 and until something is posted. I mean currently that stands at like $20,000 higher than last year.”

“Last year you had a wage increases so it would always be higher,” said Commissioner John Christy, who serves on the prison board as vice president.

On the numbers for medical, Merhige said that “if you look it shows two months posted there, and even though it’s only the end of January, for whatever reason, the beginning of the year, we always have too much posted by the end of January. You will notice the food service looks like it’s zero but we paid $72,000 that will be posted this Friday with a pay.”

There were no questions for Merhige so a motion to approve the January budget report was approved pending audit.

Deputy Warden of Operations Phil Diliberto reported that the water usage across the street at Pleasant Valley Manor was good because the usage came down 100,000 gallons, and last month’s usage was about a million gallons.

“It was a big drop, which looks really good. Here at the correctional facility, we also came down a little, not much,” he said.

The facility is not going to renew its contract on with Blue Ridge Cable and has been exploring other options and has narrowed it down to Dish Network

“I had the Dish Network people come out here. I think it was last week and they wanted to mount the dish on the roof, but the facility is going to replace the roof this spring, and I don’t know how long the roof project is going to take,” Diliberto said.

He told the board he is working on where the dish could be mounted and will speak with the Dish Network engineer to solve the problem.

The board has opted to lease the equipment and the company maintains the equipment for $4,500 at signing, versus purchasing the equipment for $11,000 and own and maintain the equipment.

The inmate count was for December was 373 with one COVID illness.