Millions of dollars a year in profits from San Diego County jail commissaries are used by the sheriff’s department to pay routine expenses rather than to support programs that benefit the men and women in custody as initially intended, the grand jury has found.
Not only that, educational and other initiatives that do get funded are not monitored for their effectiveness, jurors said. The welfare fund has not been audited in years, and the public has no real representation on the committee in charge of spending the money, they added.
In a 19-page report issued late last week, the San Diego County grand jury said both the sheriff’s department and county supervisors should take decisive steps to reform how the profits generated by incarcerated people and their families are invested.
“While (detainee) welfare funds were originally intended to pay for correctional programs that benefit or educate incarcerated individuals, these funds have more recently been used as reserves to pay for unexpected costs associated with the normal costs of county jail operations,” the report said.
In reaching its findings, the grand jury cited a 2019 report by The San Diego Union-Tribune that raised questions about the sheriff’s management of the multimillion-dollar fund.
Among other things, the sheriff’s department used what’s now called the incarcerated persons welfare fund to pay employee salaries, maintain department vehicles, buy gasoline, pay office expenses and even buy toilets at one jail’s recreational yard, the Union-Tribune reported.
One former detainee at the Las Colinas women’s jail in Santee said goods offered in the commissary were sharply marked up. She also said sheriff’s deputies made enrolling in various enrichment programs overly burdensome.
“We sit in our cells all day for the most part,” the woman told the newspaper. “All anybody wants is something to do, a class, anything.”
Sheriff’s officials defended the spending as appropriate and noted that state law gives the department broad authority over how the fund is administered.
The grand jury wants that to change, too.
One recommendation calls for county supervisors to lobby state officials for legislation that would more strictly govern money paid by jailed people and their families.
“According to the California Penal Code, such funds were to be used ‘primarily for the benefit, education and welfare’ of incarcerated persons,” the report said.
“The normal operating costs of running a county jail — expenses for meals, clothing, housing and medical services for incarcerated individuals — were to be paid using tax-supported general funds of the sheriff’s departments,” it added.
Neither Sheriff Kelly Martinez nor Board of Supervisors Chair Nora Vargas responded to requests for comment about the grand jury findings or recommendations.
Both are legally required to formally respond to the report this summer.
Welfare funds to support men and women in California jails date back to the late 1940s, when then-Gov. Earl Warren authorized sheriffs to sell cigarettes, candy and personal products from small stores.
“By state law, these funds were to be used ‘solely’ for the ‘benefit, education and welfare’ of the incarcerated individuals,” the grand jury report notes.
But the requirement was loosened in 1993 to say profits should be used primarily — not solely — to benefit people in custody. The same law also granted elected sheriffs discretion to spend the money on department needs such as jail maintenance and employee salaries.
In recent decades, the profits generated by commissaries in San Diego County jails have swelled to millions of dollars per year.
Sheriff’s officials acknowledged in 2019 that the jail stores were generating up to $4 million a year for the welfare fund. They also said the fund oversight committee was supervising a reserve of more than $13 million — three times its required savings.
“We have begun spending down the available fund balance on new program contracts,” Christine Brown-Taylor, then-manager of re-entry services for the sheriff, said at the time. “And (we) will be spending more fund balance this fiscal year on expanding vocational programs and vocational equipment needs.”
It is not clear how much progress the sheriff’s department may have made toward spending down the reserves, because officials would not release details on the fund balance. Instead, the department said the questions would be processed as a request under the California Public Records Act.
“I submitted a CPRA request on your behalf,” a spokesperson said by email. “Someone will be reaching out to you in the future about the fund balances.”
The welfare fund revenue may have declined in recent years due to a decision two years ago by the Board of Supervisors.
In response to the pandemic, the supervisors in 2021 approved a measure to make telephone calls and video visits free for incarcerated people and their friends and families.
At the time, the sheriff’s telephone contractor was paying the department some $2.8 million a year for its share of the profits.
Prior to the pandemic, one 15-minute phone call from a San Diego County jail cost an incarcerated person almost $5, according to the Prison Policy Initiative, a nonprofit Massachusetts think tank.
In total, the grand jury report includes 11 recommendations that it said would improve the operation and administration of the welfare-fund program.
Seven of those suggestions are directed to the sheriff and four to the Board of Supervisors. Neither the sheriff nor supervisors are required to implement the recommendations.
Specifically, the sheriff should update the bylaws and operating procedures that govern the welfare fund in order to better define permissible and non-permissible uses for the money, and see that funds are used to directly benefit people in jail, the grand jury said.
The department also should create a detailed, multiyear spending plan; prevent using so much of the fund for salaries; and expand the fund oversight committee to include at least three qualified people unaffiliated with the sheriff’s department, including formerly incarcerated people and family members of people in jail, jurors said.
“Limiting the membership on the committee to only one long-standing civilian member does not allow San Diego County’s diverse citizenship to be adequately represented or differing viewpoints to be heard,” the grand jury said.
The sheriff also should specify terms and term limits for new committee members and spell out experience guidelines and training for those volunteers, jurors recommended.
Finally, the sheriff’s department should develop new revenue streams to augment and leverage the welfare fund and study its current menu of classes and programs for their effectiveness in reducing recidivism, the grand jury said.
County supervisors have a major role to play in reforming the welfare fund administration as well, according to the grand jurors.
Foremost, supervisors should appoint advisory panels of experts to review operations and advise both the county and the sheriff on promoting evidence-based correctional education and training programs, they recommended.
The board also should authorize an independent review of county jails’ current education and training efforts, the report said. Supervisors also should direct county auditors to assess the welfare fund every three years, it added.
Lastly, county supervisors should instruct their lobbying team to pressure state policymakers to repeal the 1993 law allowing welfare funds to pay for routine sheriff’s expenses like salaries and equipment, the grand jury said.
Gov. Gavin Newsom vetoed similar legislation in 2020 and again last year.
“While I am supportive of this fund being used to support incarcerated individuals, I am concerned that this takes flexibility away from counties and that this could impact programs they provide to the incarcerated population,” he said in his 2022 veto message.
The sheriff is required to submit a response to the grand jury findings by July 31. The county Board of Supervisors must file its reply by Aug. 29.
