The Washington County Commission discussed grants, department late fees and funding proposals during its weekly meeting Thursday. (Photo by Amber Phipps)

The Washington County Commission met for its weekly Thursday morning meeting.

Business was as usual with the exception of a few finalized appropriations that made headway in the county.

The commission approved new funding for the opioid remediation grant which will allow for a coordinator to be established at the county jail that’ll assist with programs sought by Sheriff Mark Warden.

“After 30 years at the Sheriff’s Office I want to try something different,” said Warden. “We want to try to move these individuals right from the facility into rehab and it has no effect on their criminal charges whatsoever.”

The approval for the coordinator fund is expected to be extremely impactful and according to Commissioner James Booth, has already made an impact on substance control in the county.

Department late fees have been a recurring discussion on the agenda. The county receives bills through the mail which can often run late to the point where departments are forced to use a credit card to pay. An issue arises when the cost to pay the late fee is cheaper than using the county credit card to pay the bill on time.

With this problem recurring every week within different county departments, the commission is eager to fix this problem.

“I call on the auditor to figure this out because it’s their job to get the bills paid in a timely manner and if the U.S. Postal Service sends it to us and it’s due the next day, then there ought to be provisions made to get this paid to where taxpayers aren’t paying late fees,” said Booth.

Director of the Washington County Department of Job and Family Services Flite Freimann proposed a solution to make all bills electronic.

“The simplest solution, respectfully, would be if the auditor would accept an electronic bill,” said Freimann. “It’s 2025 and none of us pay our bills like this.”

Departments in the county have also noticed that they’re spending too much time on the phone with utility companies to discuss these payments and late fees.

After the discussion, the late fees from the engineering department were approved and the commission has plans to discuss changes with the auditor to prevent future billing complications.

The commission decided to table the 911 Funding Proposal due to an upcoming meeting on April 3 which would provide a more in-depth discussion about the funds.

The 911 Funding Proposal will help pay for Marietta and Belpre’s 911 costs. The total comes to $129,307 in Marietta and $45,724 in Belpre.

Commissioner Eddie Place wanted to table the discussion because he wants to learn more about a centralized 911 center. In order to accomplish this, additional funds would need to be put towards the call system.

“I would like to learn more because can we afford this?” said Place. “And are we going to agree that a centralized 911 center is best for Washington County?”

The commission approved to table the discussion until after the meeting on April 3 that would provide more details on numbers and what the best 911 call system would be for the county.

The commission also approved a contract for housing prisoners in the Monroe County Jail for $65 a day.

There are currently 142 inmates in a jail facility that should only hold 124, so the Washington County Sheriff’s Office is working on moving about 15 individuals to the Monroe County Jail after commission approval.