Serving Clovis, Portales and the Surrounding Communities
Serving Clovis, Portales and the Surrounding Communities
The Roosevelt County Commission expressed concern Tuesday morning about rumors that the county commission is not paying the city of Portales for services.
Commissioner Tina Dixon brought up the rumors during Tuesday’s regular commission meeting as commissions came to a decision to approve providing the city a notice of detention billing requirements. Dixon did not identify who is making these claims, but insisted they need to be put to a stop.
“There are comments being made that the county is not paying their bills to the city of Portales,” Dixon said. “With that I would like to make it clear that we do pay our bills. We have the check numbers that the bills were paid, when they were invoiced, within the 30-day period. The comments that are saying that we are not, are straight up lies,” Dixon said.
County Attorney Michael Garcia said that the county should look into creating an invoice for detention billing so that all county expenses would be recorded and send an “appropriate” and “reasonable” bill to Portales for inmates being housed in the Roosevelt Detention Center.
Dixon said that Portales has been paying an average of $55 per inmate for each full-day of housing in the detention center. It was then proposed to raise the price to $155 per day to cover the cost of medical and transport assistance for detainees.
Both Garcia and Dixon said at the meeting that after speaking with legal counsel in New Mexico counties, they were able to confirm that there is no law stating that they cannot charge them higher rates.
Detention Center Administrator Shayla Ramsey said that Portales detainees take about 75% of the capacity of the center and that the city has not been covering things such as transportation or medical services, which has been covered by the Roosevelt county commission for the past several years.
Dixon added that other locations are charged a total of $856,370 for detection services, whereas Portales is given a lesser fee. She said that the county also pays the city’s water bill at the detention center, which is about $15,000 per year. Other services, such as the food pantry and the emergency operation center are offered to Portales.
Commissioner Rodney Savage mentioned that the commission is working on a deal with San Miguel County, under which San Miguel County will be paying $124 per inmate each full day of housing. Commissioner Roy Lee Criswell said the prices are slightly lower than those charged to Portales because San Miguel will be covering its own medical and transport expenses.
County Commissioner Dennis Lopez said that in order to obtain fair market value and to ensure that the detention center can maintain its services, a change is required. The commission unanimously authorized a change in detention billing requirements for the City of Portales.
In other matters during Tuesday’s commission meeting:
• Detention Center Administrator, Shayla Ramsey gave a fourth quarter restricted housing report for the month of June. Roosevelt county has so far spent $3,740 for Portales, $18,975 for Quay county, $1,650 for Chavez County and a total of $342,264 for the juvenile detention yearly budget.
• The Aug. 8 commission meeting will be moved to Aug. 15, so that the Roosevelt county commissioners can attend another meeting.
• Commissioners discussed the Sagebrush Sand Dune Lizard.
• The commission unanimously revised the county’s per-diem travel allowance from $30 to $59 a day, to cover inflation. The overnight stay allowance for employees will remain at $215 per night.
• The commission unanimously approved a fee-stipend policy for the county’s volunteer fire departments.
• The commission approved notification of what will be on the Nov. 7 local election ballot.
• The commission approved RISE Grant Award of $339,600 from the NM Behavioral Health Services Division and ap state opioid response grant of $22,875.62 for the Roosevelt County Detention Center medication-assisted treatment mental health program.
• The commission approved the Detainee Confinement Agreement with San Miguel County.
• On a unanimous vote, the commission approved representation and access agreements between Roosevelt County and Singleton Schreiber, a San Diego, Calif., law firm with an office in Clovis, that is representing the county in lawsuit involving contamination of water supplies with PFAS chemicals.
