CARROLLTON — The Carroll County Board of Supervisors will terminate the contract with Mississippi Correctional Management, which was hired to assist the regional jail at Vaiden.
The board voted unanimously Wednesday to terminate the contract with MCM after giving 30 days’ notice.
The company is owned by Irb Benjamin, who has been indicted for allegedly providing kickbacks and bribes to former state Corrections Commissioner Chris Epps to secure contracts for his company. Benjamin, one of two people accused, said he will prove the charges to be baseless.
The board had agreed to keep the company as jail consultants for the Carroll-Montgomery Regional Correctional facility until after the American Corrections Association audit, which took place earlier this month. Warden Arthur Smith had told the board he needed help with all of the paperwork that had to be prepared for the audit.
In a special called meeting Wednesday, Beat 1 Supervisor Terry Herbert told the other board members they could retain the company until the end of the contract, which was signed February 10, 2014; terminate with no cause with 30 days’ notice; or terminate the contract immediately “with cause.”
“They were supposed to be financial advisers,” Beat 5 Supervisor Rickie Corley said. “Excuse me, but we’re in a hell of a mess.”
Beat 4 Supervisor Claude Fluker asked Smith to give his opinion about the company. Smith said the company had done a good job and recommended keeping them.
“They were on call when I needed them. They can give advice but don’t have any control over what the board decides,” Smith said. “The county has two deputies and a maintenance man paid out of the budget.”
“So you’re blaming the board for our financial woes?” Corley asked Smith.
“I came to the board years ago and asked about taking the deputies out,” Smith said. “We can’t say it’s all MCM. It’s not. The revenue is to support the jail, not the county.”
Herbert said Sheriff Jerry Carver had asked the board to put the deputies in the jail budget. “We went along. He didn’t have room in his budget. We can’t have floating revenue and spend like it stays the same. It’s beyond your control. MDOC is pulling inmates.”
Smith said there had been no unnecessary spending or abuse of spending, and cuts were made wherever possible.
“Lots of things we went without trying to stay within the budget,” he said. “You’ve got to feed inmates, have guards to keep the place open.”
Smith said he has major problems getting employees to come to work, especially to fill in for others. “They want overtime pay. They won’t hardly work for comp time,” he said.
Herbert congratulated Smith on receiving high marks in the ACA audit.
Carroll’s business manager, Marlee Golden, told the board the budget was in good shape but cash flow was not, because the jail was budgeted for 270 inmates, and currently there are around 224.
“It’s going to get worse,” Smith said.
“Nobody came to ask us about taking the deputies out,” Corley said. How can y’all be in the front office and can’t make payroll and don’t know it?”
Smith said it was “a lot of stuff,” including the lack of a cost-of-living adjustment for the amount received regularly from the state.
“I didn’t know until they told me not to come pick up checks,” he said.
Golden said the finances were available to everyone. “Every month I have let people know the money is going, going, gone. I’m not the auditor or the board, but I try to let people know. Just because it’s over here, you can’t say people don’t know,” she said.
Fluker asked if the jail has outstanding revenue.
Vicki Lipscomb, office manager at CMRCF, told the board the jail is owed several months’ payments from MDOC and said she has not been able to “get a human on the phone” there.
“Go down there; do whatever you have to,” Herbert said.
When asked his opinion on keeping MCM, Sheriff-elect Clint Walker told the board he wanted to sever the relationship because of the indictment. “Their ties with Irb Benjamin are enough for me. I have full confidence in the staff coming in,” he said.
Walker told the board he is looking for other sources of revenue for the jail, such as taking inmates from other states that have problems with overcrowding. He named Arkansas and Louisiana. He said he would like to go ahead and get that process started with board permission.
Herbert told him to attend the meeting on Monday when an attorney would be there to say whether it is possible for him to go ahead and begin.
“I’m excited about coming in. We’re looking to go forward,” Walker said.
Also Wednesday, the board voted to allow Herbert to make a lease/purchase agreement on a truck. Herbert said both of the Beat 2 trucks had 300,000 miles on them and were 15 years old.
“You ought to wait and let the new man get what he wants,” Beat 2 Supervisor Honey Ashmore said. Herbert did not run for re-election this year.
“I didn’t want to buy one, but if I’m going to do the job until January, I need a truck,” Herbert said. “The next man can decide if he wants to pay it off.”
Ashmore questioned Herbert about how much debt was left on a Mack truck he had bought.
“There will be three payments left when I leave,” Herbert said. “That’s better than the $200,000 I got when I took over.”
The board voted 3-1 to allow the truck purchase at state contract price, with financing from Trustmark Bank at 2.09 percent for 48 months and a payment of $671.
