P R E S S R E L E A S E 
 

Date: September19, 2002

Contact: Linda Hoskins

Subject: NAACP's Response to Jail Audit

On Tuesday, Dane County officials released an audit of the Dane County health services. Among other things, the audit indicates that not only are the actual medical services inmates receive deplorable, but the private health care company in charge of health care in the Jail was over billing for its medical services.

This report is shocking! We’d like to say that we’re surprised at the audit’s findings. But, we can’t. For years, the NAACP has shone a light on the deplorable medical and living conditions in the Dane County Jail. However, officials paid little attention to the inmates’ concerns until a young man in the Dane County Jail’s custody, died under questionable circumstances.

For almost a decade, Dane County officials gave Midwest Health full reign to bilk the taxpayers of Dane County under the guise of providing health care to inmates. We are pleased to hear that Dane County officials are searching for better medical care for the jail. The NAACP, however, remains concerned that even if there is a new health care provider for the jail, and a new contract, and a "contract compliance monitor," the same officials who failed the taxpayers for almost a decade, are ultimately responsible for overseeing the jail’s health care service provider.

In light of this, the NAACP calls for the following: 1) We want to know how much money Midwest Health was paid by Dane County in total -- both for agreed upon contracts and through over billing; 2) We want all funds gained through failure to perform agreed upon services and from ill-gotten gains to be fully accounted for and returned Dane County taxpayers; 3) We call for state and federal investigators to audit not only the jail contract, but we want sample audits of the county’s contracts audited. We want to know if this kind of mismanagement is occurring in other areas of the county government and we want outside, independent sources to determine this. Finally, the NAACP urges the county to create a citizen oversight panel for the jail that would help shape policies regarding the jail.