By Marco Iafrate

Independent News Service Reporter

The Michigan Association of Counties represents all 83 counties in the state and has been lobbying to the House of Representatives, the Senate, as well as the governor, Gretchen Whitmer, to provide Medicaid to inmates in county jails.

MAC Executive Director Steve Currie said they are in a lobbying coalition with the Michigan Sheriff’s Association and the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services for a federal waver which would allow for Medicaid funding to continue for inmates in county jail inmates.

“So, basically what happens now when someone comes into your county jail prior to conviction, they lose any sort of health insurance coverage,” he said.

This, Currie said, means that counties pay for everything from pulling teeth to surgical operations, routine physicals, and filling prescriptions.

Kenny VanSickle, the Jail Administrator of the Mason County Sheriff’s Office, said that county jails were once required only to fund emergency operations and minimum treatments for inmates, such as pulling teeth. He said that since then, the courts have ruled this present way.

As an inmate gets processed into a county jail, he is required have a health screening. This, VanSickle said, must be done within 14 days of processing according to the law.

“With a lot of changes with Medicaid in the federal level, I don’t know what to say if it’s gonna happen or not,” he said.

All of this was reported by Currie to the Mason County Board of Commissioners at their July 8 meeting. Other things in his report are below:

County Prosecutor Vacancies

$17 million dollars was acquired in grants. The money was said to be earmarked for distribution to counties lacking employees in their prosecuting attorney offices, and even counties without a prosecuting attorney to being with. It is known that Michigan is facing a lack of county-hired attorneys. MAC expects to be able to award this money to 15 prosecutor offices in the state.

What is happening, he said, is county-employed prosecuting attorneys have been leaving their jobs and working for the Michigan Indigent Defense Commission.

This, it is getting more, “expensive,” for counties to keep their attorneys.

Many of these attorneys were said to be preferring to work for the MIDC as a contractor instead of being hired directly by a county. It is a preference of many attorneys due to the higher pay than what a county can afford these days.

Currie said that MAC desires to, “balance that out a little bit.”

Additionally, he said that MAC lobbies for increases funding in the MIDC which Mason County Prosecutor Beth Hand said has been in an ongoing hiring competition with the counties themselves.

It has also been said by Hand that Dana Nessel, the Michigan Attorney General, has been, “pitch hitting,” for local county prosecuting offices.

Minimum Staffing as a requirement for Collective Bargaining

“Some of the legislation we we’re able to fend of during the legislative session, minimum staffing was subject to collective bargaining,” Currie said.

In Michigan, Senate Bill 1167 and House Bill 4688 were proposed to amend the Public Employment Relations Act to make minimum staffing levels mandatory in collective bargaining. It would have been mostly for police and fire departments.

“We we’re not in support of that,” he said.

Local Government Committee Eliminated

The Michigan House voted to eliminate the subject committee, which traditionally reviewed legislation.

It was the committee where, “many of our bills went to,” Currie said. What he said this means is that those bills are now going to spread out to multiple committees rather than the one.

In unrelated news, Curried explained that the governor and senate each have their own crime reduction fund. The governor has $75 million in hers, none of which is earmarked for county-use. As for the senate, they have $100 million, $60 million of which is earmarked or counties.

Finally, are some brief mentions of what else MAC has been lobbying for:.

• Increases in small business funding.

• Publicly funded health insurance increases for counties.

• A success of theirs was acquiring a sum of $30 million dollars. Currie said it is to be earmarked for county revenue sharing.

When the floor was opened to questions, Commissioner Jordan Hartley asked the executive director if, “there are any plans to replace to school safety funding that was diverted to the free tuition in community colleges?”

“So, schools are the one thing at MAC that we don’t track very much because we just don’t do schools in Michigan. So, I can’t answer that question directly,” Currie said.

Editor’s Note:

If you desire to become a county commissioner, MAC partners with Michigan State University to conduct a school for people looking so.