Ka-ching for the clink: jail fee increases

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Serving time in the Washington County Jail? Get ready to shell out more money.

Washington County Sheriff Bill Hutton asked county commissioners today to raise the jail booking fee from $10 to $25. The increase is allowed under a new state law, he said, and it narrows the gap between what is charged and what it costs to pay sheriff’s deputies who handle book-ins.

Commissioners voted 5-0 for the increase.

The fee applies to people booked into jail to serve a court-ordered sentence, not to people who are booked and released on charges such as driving penalties.

The sheriff’s office collected $51,700 in jail booking revenue in 2008. The fee increase is expected to net the office another $50,000 annually, Hutton said.

See the Dec. 2 print edition of the Woodbury Bulletin for more on this story.

Tags: washington county, crime and courts, news, sheriff