L.A. County supervisors demand jail improvement

LOS ANGELES (AP) -- County supervisors have demanded that the Sheriff's Department do more to improve medical and mental health care for the county's 20,000 jail inmates to avoid coming under a federal consent decree.

The U.S. Department of Justice has been investigating Los Angeles County jails the past five years, reporting chronic understaffing, lax medical care, mishandling of medical records and errors in dispensing medication.

"I don't want a consent decree on our jails," said Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky. Federal consent decrees mandate oversight duties to the federal government. They already are in place over three Los Angeles entities: the Police Department, the school district and the mass transit authority.

The decrees must first be approved by a judge.

"You never want to get under a consent decree," said Supervisor Don Knabe. "They are always very expensive solutions."

The state of the county's jails has been a worry for supervisors, who have had to spend tens of millions in taxpayer dollars to settle civil rights lawsuits involving poor conditions. Just recently, the county agreed to settle a suit for $27 million because it held prisoners in custody past their release dates.

Sheriff's officials have admitted serious problems exist, but said they need more money to better manage the nation's largest jail system, which incarcerates nearly 200,000 men and women a year.

At a meeting earlier this month, supervisors ordered Sheriff Lee Baca to use $50 million in his Inmate Welfare Fund to hire more medical staff. Baca offered to use $2.5 million if the county would match that amount each year.

Baca admits jail clinics are understaffed and wants to hire 71 nurses and doctors.

American Civil Liberties Union spokesman Ben Wizner said Baca should get the money. "They only have about 50 percent of the medical staff they need," he said. "They need about twice as many doctors and nurses."

New York officials spend $105 million on medical treatment for 13,500 inmates at Rikers Island Jail compared to $70 million Los Angeles County spends on 20,000 inmates.

Attorney Stephen Yagman, who has filed lawsuits over medical care in jails, said the cost of fixing the problem is less than settling the cases.

"While the politicos dispute with one another who should pay for what, the people in the jail system don't get medical care," he said.