County Could Lose Funds to Jail Illegals

More of your tax dollars will be spent on housing illegal immigrants. That's if the feds don't cough up the cash. Yuma County is taking action now to get the funding it needs. Illegal immigration is a federal and state wide effort, but the funding the battle has county coffers low on cash. Now the Obama administration is ready to bail out of it's share of jail costs.

The reason is to spend more money on measures to stop illegal border crossers before they cross.

"If we're going to house these prisoners here, these federal prisonsers here, on federal charges, it should not be at the expense of the Yuma County tax payers," says Yuma County Administrator Robert Pickels.

He is now taking steps to get the money that the county deserves.

"The board of supervisors today authorized the issuance of a letter that each one of the board members will be signing a letter to the president that will be expressing our desire that congress find a way to come up with the money to fully fund the program for this year."

The feds have racked up a huge tab. Last year Arizona paid $124 million to house 5,600 illegal suspects. This year the state expects to shell out $128 million for 6,100 illegal offenders currently in the prison system.

In 2008 the feds only reimbursed about $12 million.

Pickels says Yuma County will not take the budget burden without a battle. The county expects to cover some $5 million to keep illegals in custody this year, but with budget plans underway, every penny counts.

http://www.kswt.com/global/story.asp?s=10460146