Butler County receives grant to treat prison inmates with drug use disorder
The county was awarded $200,000 in state funding to cover some of this year’s cost of providing medication for inmates with prescriptions for drug abuse treatment.
County commissioners on Wednesday, Jan. 31, said the Pennsylvania Commission on Crime and Delinquency awarded the county $200,000, which is 75% of a $266,668 grant the commissioners applied for last year for the Medication Assisted Treatment program.
The grant comes from federal money being administered by the state commission and has to be spent this year.
The prison has been offering the program for the last couple years to treat inmates struggling with addiction who have prescriptions for the treatment when they enter the prison.
Commissioner Kevin Boozel said the grant will not cover the entire cost of the program.
A report presented at the last prison board meeting on Jan. 16 revealed the county spent $410,036 on the program in 2023. To cover the cost, $232,635 was transferred from the county’s opioid settlement fund and $178,001 was taken from operating funds.
Prison staffing issues were addressed at the salary board meeting held before Wednesday’s commissioner’s meeting.
The board converted 20 part-time correction officer positions to full-time positions with no change in hourly pay. The pay rate varies from $22.10 to $27.62 an hour depending on how long they have worked for the county. Nineteen of the 20 positions are filled and one is vacant.
The move will help reduce overtime costs, reduce gaps in staffing and improve security, said Leslie Osche, chairwoman of the commissioners and a member of the salary board.
Warden Beau Sneddon said help is needed to retain and hire officers. He said 40% of officers have worked at the prison for three years or less.
He said officers have left due to job burn out and he has not been able to hire some highly qualified candidates because they wanted full-time jobs when none were available.
In addition, the board gave the eight remaining casual officers, who work less than 1,000 hours a year and don’t receive benefits, a $1 an hour pay raise to $19 an hour.
The prison used to have 20 casual officers making $18 an hour, but only eight are left, so the board eliminated the 20 positions and replaced then with the eight who will be paid $19 an hour.
Those casual officers work two days a week and it takes them months to complete the 160 hours of training required for them to work alone, Sneddon said. The eight remaining casual guards are good employees who have already finished the training, but Sneddon said he won’t replace them if they leave.
In other business, the board created a position for a full-time probation officer whose duty will be to make sure that district judges receive driving under the influence conviction records of suspects who appear in their courts.
President Common Pleas Court Judge S. Michael Yeager told the board that it is “extremely important” for district judges to have those records so they can make informed decisions on a suspect’s bond. He said district judges receive that information now on a “hit and miss” basis.
The position was created, but hasn’t been filled yet. The hourly pay ranges from $24.35 to $30.43 depending on years of employment.
