Inmate mental health care receives $62K boost

Mental health issues plague many inmates in Wayne County’s jail, according to Sheriff Randy Retter, making access to mental health care vitally important.

To that end, Retter requested during Wayne County Council’s Aug. 5 meeting that it provide an extra $62,000 in his 2027 budget to double mental health services in the jail from 20 to 40 hours each week. Council agreed, boosting the healthcare item in Retter’s jail budget to $1,142,000.

Retter said mental health risks are constantly present inside the jail, and available mental health services help recognize inmates’ changing conditions and mitigate those risks. With council’s approval for 2027, Retter will cover this year’s cost of immediately increasing mental health care.

Within the $7 million jail budget, council also agreed to double the medical testing line item from $65,000 to $130,000 and boost the insurance copay from $160,000 to $250,000. Retter said healthcare provider Quality Correctional Care increasingly sends inmates to medical providers for tests and other services, necessitating both increases.

Quality Correctional Care’s contract will expire midway through 2027, so the healthcare contract cost is likely to increase in the last half of the year.

Retter also presented a $4.6 million enforcement budget that was trimmed by $280,000 when estimated retirement contributions were lowered from $950,000 to $670,000.

Council heard the $213,894 Purdue Extension budget request from Justin Curley, regional operations leader for Wayne, Randolph, Union, Jay and Blackford counties. The request included $140,000 for Extension’s contracted services, plus $42,124 for the program’s Wayne County secretary.

The $140,000 is determined by population and Purdue pools it with other counties’, state and federal contributions to pay employees. Purdue is implementing a regional concept throughout the state after Wayne County was part of a pilot program. Each county will have educators based there, but the educators will provide programming throughout their regions.

Overall, council is operating with a $43 million general fund budget, over $3 million more than the 2026 adopted budget of $40,067,734. The budget does include an extra $3 million placeholder in council’s one-time project line item, but it does not yet contain raises for county employees.

MUST meeting

Council voted to organize a Municipal Unit Strategic Taskforce to discuss the municipal local income tax rate that council must enact in 2028 when the state’s taxing structure continues changing. 

Max Smith, president of council, was chosen as council’s representative. The fiscal officer of each city and town also will be invited to join the task force. Smith will investigate a date for the first meeting, which will be open to the public, hoping that others from council and the municipalities will also attend.

Smith said that council has been assigned important duties determining LIT rates and cooperation among taxing units will be important.

The task force can reach a unanimous LIT distribution agreement that can be submitted to the state by Nov. 2. The tax rate, which will be divided among towns by population, is capped at 1.2%. Because its population exceeds 3,500, Richmond has the option of joining the county-wide rate or establishing its own rate.

Other actions

• Council unanimously approved an amended interlocal agreement that removes the maximum cost Union County will pay Wayne County to provide emergency communications services while exploring a permanent consolidation.
• Commissioner Aaron Roberts told council that the committee overseeing opioid settlement money distribution would accept funding applications Sept. 1 to 30. Roberts said the application would appear on the county’s website prior to the application period opening. 
• Council unanimously approved paying $7,000 from its contingency fund for HWC Engineering to provide support fulfilling state mandates about housing. The state is requiring reports that contain information about housing issues such as building permits and housing starts as well as community engagement activities about housing needs. 
• During council’s personnel committee meeting, members approved posting and hiring two truck drivers for the highway department, a deputy prosecutor and a public defender.