Prisoners could be sent back

The Evangeline Parish Police Jury set a budget of $20,000 a month to pay for prisoners being housed outside of the parish, but as the number of inmates has risen the police jury is now finding themselves unable to pay all of their bills for inmate housing, which is required of them by law.
If the police jury can’t pay their bill, Evangeline Parish can expect to get their inmates sent back even though Evangeline’s jail is at full capacity at this time.
According to the former warden of the Caldwell Parish jail C. A. Frederick, Caldwell Parish began housing some of Evangeline Parish’s inmates after an agreement was made between representatives from the two jails back in April of 2015.
Frederick along with former Caldwell Parish Sheriff Steve May, former Evangeline Parish Warden Elliot Thomas and Lt. Tonya Ellis with Caldwell Parish agreed upon paying Caldwell $22.39 a day per prisoner, but with approximately 64 Evangeline Parish inmates in Caldwell’s jail, it will take more than $20,000 to pay the bill.
The cost of the 64 inmates in Caldwell Parish at this time would put the police jury’s bill for the first 12 days in August already at $17,195.52. However, due to plea deals being made last Thursday in court, the number of inmates in Caldwell may be lower now, but the police jury will still have to pay for the days that these prisoners spent in Caldwell’s jail.
The $20,000 set to be used for inmate housing outside of the parish comes from the EPPJ’s anticipated surplus throughout the year.
Although they anticipate having a higher surplus than $20,000, EPPJ Secretary/Treasurer Donald Bergeron said, “We can’t spend every dollar on the housing of inmates incase something happens in the parish and we end up needing that money. Budgeting to spend all of our surplus on inmate housing is like planning a household around what you make working overtime. That overtime pay might not always be there, so it wouldn’t make sense to do that.”
According to Caldwell Parish Sheriff Clay Bennett, the EPPJ has just been sent their bill for the month of July, which totaled $35,000, and if it can’t be paid then Bennett said “they will have to get their prisoners back.”
Bennett said, “We appreciate them allowing us to house their prisoners, but they are going to have to pay. We can’t feed them, can’t house them, and can’t afford the man power if they don’t pay. There are no hard feelings, but it’s a business deal. We are going to get paid, or we have to send them back.”
According to Ber-geron, “over the last seven months, the police jury has spent on average $22,253 per month for prisoners being housed outside of the parish,” and with the “number of inmates climbing,” so will the cost.
At this time, the police jury is uncertain on how they will handle this matter, but meetings that will involve some jurors have been set for next week. These meetings however, will be closed to the public.
For the Evangeline Parish Sheriff’s Office, they hope this issue can be resolved because if prisoners are sent back then they will have to find a way to house them.
Major Jeremy Mitc-hell with the Evangeline Parish Sheriff’s Office said, “We don’t have the room for all of these inmates, nor do we have the manpower to house them. It is the police jury’s responsibility to maintain housing, and so we are hoping that this situation gets resolved in a timely fashion.”