Sheriff takes aim at Rock Hill comments after Tega Cay, York County, reach inmate suit settlement
Tega Cay will be dropped from a York County legal case over jail inmates, while the sheriff takes aim at comments made by Rock Hill officials.
Late last month, York County and the sheriff filed suit against the cities of Rock Hill and Tega Cay. The suit states Fort Mill, Clover and York agreed to pay the county $73 per day per inmate to house municipal arrest inmates, but Rock Hill and Tega Cay didn’t.
On Monday night, after more than an hour in closed session to discuss the inmates and other legal issues, the York County Council voted to approve an intergovernmental agreement with Tega Cay and take steps to remove the city from litigation.
County attorney Michael Kendree said the agreement is between the county, Sheriff’s Office and City of Tega Cay. The city will pay money owed prior to being dropped from litigation, Kendree confirmd. Further details weren’t discussed publicly when council voted to approved the deal.
“This is an agreement specifying the per diem costs for municipal inmates that are housed with York County for municipal violations,” Kendree said.
Charlie Funderburk, city manager for Tega Cay, told The Rock Hill Herald Wednesday his council approved the agreement in a special meeting last week. Tega Cay received notice Tuesday the county approved its part of the deal.
“We’ve been working through an agreement with the sheriff and county really ever since they sent us the first one in December, on and off,” he said. “Just trying to see if we could find some middle ground that both sides agree with.”
Funderburk said work is underway to release Tega Cay from the lawsuit.
“We never got served with a lawsuit,” Funderburk said. “Obviously we know it was filed, but it never got served. So they’re amending that.”
Funderburk said his city is comfortable with the new deal and is ready to move forward.
“Glad to put that in our rear view mirror and get back to the business at hand,” he said.
Sheriff on Rock Hill comments
On Tuesday, an attorney for the York County Sheriff’s Office sent a statement from Sheriff Kevin Tolson and background information on the litigation, to The Herald.
In it, Tolson took issue with the idea there isn’t justification for how fees were calculated. Here’s the statement:
Normally, I do not comment on matters in litigation; however, in this case, I feel that I need to address some of Rock Hill’s statements regarding municipal inmates that are housed at the York County Detention Center. The City and the County have a fundamental disagreement about which entity is responsible for the care of inmates with municipal charges and we are using the legal system to work through this disagreement. Our justice system is well equipped to resolve disagreements of this nature.
I have no issues with the City’s statement regarding their position, but I am baffled by the City stating that there was, “no adequate justification... for how the fee was calculated.” Over the past year, I have spent too many hours to count talking with City leaders about this issue, the fee calculation and why it was changed. I do not understand why the City stated that the fee was changed, “with no provision of information or background on how the fee was calculated,” because I sent an email to Mayor Gettys and City Manager David Vehaun on January 5, 2022 that clearly laid out how the new fee was calculated. I am attaching that email to this statement so that the people can see for themselves the information that was provided to the City.
I make this statement at this time to be clear to the citizens of York County that I did everything in my power to resolve the disagreement regarding the care of municipal inmates without resorting to the courts for resolution.
Tolison’s statement is in response to one offered by Rock Hill last month. It states:
Today, York County took the unfortunate step of filing a lawsuit against municipalities in York County. The County is completely aware of the City of Rock Hill position that these fees have historically been paid voluntarily as they are not required under state law.
The City does not entirely object to voluntarily paying a fee; however, the City only plans to do so under a fairly negotiated agreement. Just over one year ago, York County unilaterally and arbitrarily announced it was raising the daily fees for boarding prisoners to almost $100 per prisoner per day, essentially doubling the fee. This was done with no provision of information or background on how the fee was calculated.
Many of the municipalities in York County announced they would not pay these fees. Several months later the County provided new information to the municipalities that reduced these arbitrary fees by approximately 20%. However, again no adequate justification was provided for how the fee was calculated.
In the spirit of cooperation and good faith, the City has paid all fees associated with the dispute. The fee has been voluntarily paid, even though there is no law requiring the City to do so. In fact, the state statute requires the County to board all municipal prisoners with no provision for fees....
Beyond paying these fees, City of Rock Hill taxpayers already fund operations related to the Sheriff’s Office through County property taxes paid to the tune of approximately $7.9 million a year. Surely, Rock Hill residents have paid their fair share to York County for these services.
The City has made several offers on how we would be comfortable moving forward under a fairly negotiated agreement; however, York County has refused to negotiate. We look forward to providing additional information before the court and vigorously defending the residents of Rock Hill all of whom are also residents of York County.
A January email from Tolson to Rock Hill city officials provided by the sheriff’s office mentioned a proposed intergovernmental agreement with a $73-per-day, per-inmate rate effective Jan. 1.
That cost is up from almost $43 at the end of last year. A separate, same-day email from Tolson to city and county officials notes the new rate was calculated for inmates with municipal (city or town) charges only, not inmates with municipal and general sessions charges which is how municipalities were charged previously.
