San Bernardino County taxpayers and the federal government will pay $800,000 next year to provide kidney dialysis to inmates in the county jail system who need that treatment.
Since 1998, the sheriff’s department has contracted with outside dialysis providers to provide on-site dialysis treatment, which, according to lieutenant Sam Fisk, “is more efficient operationally, provides increased public safety, and is more economical than transporting inmates to a dialysis clinic for treatment.”
American Correctional Solutions, Inc. has provided dialysis to county inmates since 2012 and the county elected to renew its contract this week. “The department is requesting to exercise the second and final option to extend the current contract with American Correctional Solutions, Inc. by one year, from January 1, 2016 through December 31, 2016, and increase the amount by $800,000, (from $3,200,000 to $4,000,000), to provide dialysis services,” Fisk told the board of supervisors, which followed that recommendation.
The contract provides for compensation to American Correctional Solutions, Inc on a fee-for-service basis. The contract is not to exceed, however, $800,000 for the one year extension.
American Correctional Solutions, Inc. was initially selected to provide dialysis services as the result of a competitive process. On December 13, 2011, the board of supervisors approved Agreement No. 11-936 with American Correctional Solutions, Inc. through December 31, 2014, with two one-year options to extend. Subsequently, on December 2, 2014, the board approved Amendment No. 1 and the first one-year option to extend the contract through December 31, 2015.
“The estimated annual cost of this service, in the amount of $800,000, was included in the sheriff’s department 2015-16 detention’s general fund budget,” Fisk said. “The department typically has between two to six inmates requiring dialysis at any given time, with approximately half of those being federal prisoners, as this is one of the particular services offered by the county to the U.S. Marshals Service. Therefore of the annual contract amount, approximately 50 to 60 percent will be recovered through the county’s contract with the U.S. Marshals Service to house federal prisoners. In addition to recovering the direct cost of providing dialysis services to federal prisoners, the department also recovers $500 per day for the prisoner to be housed in the jail’s medical unit, as opposed to $80 per day for housing a typical federal prisoner.” The estimated cost of dialysis services will be defrayed with $400,000 earmarked for January through June and $400,000 to cover July through December.