Clay County Commission

Dan Haglund

The superintendent of the West Central Regional Juvenile Center delivered his department’s annual budget presentation to the Clay County Board of Commissioners on Tuesday in Moorhead.
James O’Donnell outlined the needs of his “secure” and “non-secure” department portions of the WCRJC, each requiring unique needs and increases in monetary requests.
The secure budget, which is an enterprise fund under the authority of the Clay County Board of Commissioners, but it also belongs to an 11-member cooperative service agreement with outlying counties.
O’Donnell brought the same budget before the Clay County Advisory Board last month, the result of which was preliminary approval.
In the revenue section on the secure side, $1.06 million comes in under the miscellaneous category, revenues over expenditures left over from 2023. This total does not include $125,000 for five years of body-worn cameras services, which were approved last month by the board.
The $1.06 million remainder offsets the expenses of the other member counties, O’Donnell said.
Clay County put in a request of $830,000, down about 1.5 percent from last year. And other member counties are requesting about $1.8 million, down about 1 percent from last year as well.
On the revenue section, a $1.779 million total is based on 13 non-members usage per day. O’Donnell said the juvenile center has been averaging about 19 individuals per day. The present rate represents an increase over the previous year, and currently stands at $375 per day. By comparison, the closest regional facility, O’Donnell said, charges $420 per day.
“I feel pretty confident with that (number),” O’Donnell said. “I like to be pretty conservative with that estimate, because again you don’t know what’s going to happen. In a month or two things could really change.”
As far as expenditures, O’Donnell said staffing will be up about 5 percent, which include cost-of-living adjustments and STEP guidelines. The biggest budget change he said has to do with employees’ overtime pay, which will go up from $100,000 to $150,000. O’Donnell cites “the complexity of kids” after the pandemic as one reason for additional staffing hours.
“There are different extreme cases that take specialty staff,” O’Donnell said. “It’s going to take our full-time staff until 2 in the morning to make sure everything is safe and secure.”
In the budget for the non-secure facility, O’Donnell stresses that there will be a female program starting in January. He said there will again be COLA and STEP increases, as well as with rent.
O’Donnell said predicting what will happen in the non-secure part is difficult, as there may be different mandates coming from the state.
“It’s getting worse and not better,” he said. “We’re picking up more services that should be delivered elsewhere, at the state level or wherever.” Youth are getting funneled to us that shouldn’t be with us, and we’re trying to provide the best care we can. Clay County is going above and beyond other counties.”
But he did say that youth within the Clay County get preference over non-county requests.
O’Donnell also explained that unique cases may require expensive specialists as well.
Budgetwise, the category of “medical consultant and other professional services” can be somewhat of a wild card.
“The youth will come in, and they’ll have a variety of issues,” O’Donnell said. “We might need a neuro-psych, and that might cost $4,000, and that might get the ball rolling for Social Services get them into a better placement someplace else. Ot to find a treatment plan that can happen.”
Commissioner David Ebinger, Dist. 5, commended O’Donnell for his synopsis and attention to detail.