The Beaufort County Health Department will take on health care of inmates detained in the Beaufort County Detention Center.

During the February county Board of Commissioners meeting, commissioners voted to move forward with expansion of Health Department services, in advance of the county’s budget-making process for the 2017-2018 fiscal year.

Currently, the county has a contract with Tennessee-based company Southern Health Partners to oversee inmate physical and mental health. The contract with Southern Health costs the county approximately $270,000 per year, according to jail administrator Lt. Kathryn Bryan, which does not include the additional costs of emergency room visits and inmates housed in other facilities for medical reasons.

Health Department Director James Madson has estimated a combined cost of Healthy Living Clinic to serve greater public health along with assuming inmate health care to be $150,000 — a figure that takes into account billing revenue from the clinic.

The health department expansion includes hiring three nurses, as well as an overseeing physician or nurse practitioner.

Commissioner Hood Richardson objected to the health department expansion, arguing that the county does not need to take on inmate health care.

“Let me tell you what this about. … This about adding more employees to the county payroll.

You’re going to pay for this. You’re going to lose control of services their providing to jail inmates. You’re going to be running a social program in the jail through the health department.

We don’t need to get into the business. The county does not need to get in the business of providing more private health to the public,” Richardson said, referring to the plan as “another social program.” “This is a really, really bad idea.”

However, proponents for the expansion plan say the health department takeover would be less expensive to the county and allow for better and more timely care of inmates, as well as continuity of care when released from jail as inmates would be informed of resources, such as substance abuse programs, available to them in the county. Through the contract with Southern Health, the subcontracted physician, a jail doctor in Craven County, has limited interaction with Beaufort County inmates and the nurses who oversee their care, leading to overuse of costly emergency room visits, and sheriff’s office resources, as deputies must accompany any inmate to the hospital, according to Bryan.

“If (the jail nurses) get anything in front of them that is outside the scope of their license, whether it’s an RN license or an LPN license, our default is to send them to the emergency room,” Bryan said during the meeting.

Though Richardson maintains that health screenings and continuing to cut down on the jail population, is the solution, officials believe the sheriff’s office, through the partnership with the health department, would better fulfill what the sheriff’s office is required by law to do.

“We would closely work together — two county agencies in partnership in business to do what we’re supposed to do, not in business to do profit,” Bryan said. “If we partner with the health department, our mission statements are in alignment.”

If there is an opportunity that we have by law to decrease the population in the jail then we do that,” said Chief Deputy Charlie Rose. “If a judge deems that that person is to be incarcerated then there’s nothing that the anybody, that includes jail administrator, myself or the sheriff himself (can do). … “We are not looking to solve all of their problems and their issues, but we are looking to try to mitigate as much as we can to try to get the sheriff and the sheriff’s office out the way of any problems that could arise by us failing to act.”

Commissioners voted 6-1 to move forward with the Healthy Living Clinic and its oversight of jail inmate care.