Clark County jail security cameras, equipment approved to be purchased

County leaders gave the final nod to an ordinance that will allow the purchase of new jail security equipment, and later accepted a bid to install that equipment.
The Clark County Fiscal Court approved a second reading of an ordinance to amend a $600,000 lease, allowing the court to purchase new, up-to-date equipment for the Clark County Detention Center. Originally, some money in the lease was to go toward construction of a new building for the Chemical Stockpile Emergency Preparedness Program.
At the last Fiscal Court meeting in October, however, Judge-Executive Henry Branham said CSEPP¿did not need the money originally allocated to the project, and that freed up between $80,000 and $100,000.
The court approved a bid from Sonitrol of Lexington of $65,648 to complete the camera installation and to install the associated hard drive. Branham said the amount was lower than expected.
The jail’s current recording equipment is out-of-date, and it went completely down in one instance in October. Sonitrol came and helped fix that problem. The county has been working to replace the equipment since November 2010 when the state Department of Corrections complained.
Branham said at a Fiscal Court meeting in July that the county was in negotiations with Sonitrol because of problems with the original contractor showing up to complete the work. The former company, Burdine Security Group, installed security equipment in cell block hallways, on the roof, in the kitchen and in the booking area. Branham said that work brought the jail “pretty much” in compliance with Corrections then.
The county originally aimed to complete the rest of the installation by the end of August.
The Fiscal Court also approved the second reading of an ordinance to add the job title and description of a first-class deputy jailer to the policy and procedure manual.
To qualify, a deputy has to work at the jail for at least six months. If a deputy is appointed to first-class deputy jailer, the deputy will not receive any supervising duties but will receive a pay increase from $7.25 an hour to $8 an hour.
In other business, the Fiscal Court:
— accepted the recommendations of Neely Taylor Wade Insurance to renew the county’s insurance with Bluegrass Family Health. Danny Neely and Billy Edwards spoke before the court and said originally, Bluegrass Family Health gave them a bid with a 15 percent increase. Wednesday, however, they said after they did some work, the company came back with a less than 0.5 percent increase from last year, costing the county $475.56 per employee. Neely said avoiding the original 15 percent increase saved the county almost $70,000.
— set the next budget workshop for 9:30 a.m. Wednesday, Nov. 16.
The next Fiscal Court meeting will be Tuesday, Nov. 22.