GOLDENDALE — It is, perhaps, a sad commentary on our times that the most important item to come out of the May 6 Klickitat County Board of Commissioner's meeting was Jail Administrator Bill Frantz’s announcement that they are installing a Narcan dispensing machine in the jail lobby. Narcan, also known as naloxone, is a nasal spray that is a safe and effective antidote to opioid overdoses, and has saved many lives.
“A large portion of the people that we deal with are co-dependent on alcohol and drugs and opioids,” Frantz told commissioners. “This would be a service for families who might be picking somebody up, or a person chooses to take it on the way out.”
He said his department was also waiting for monitoring equipment to be installed that could potentially save someone who had thoughts of harming themselves.
He also told commissioners he would need to have a supplemental budget for rising jail food costs. A request for proposal notice drew only one entry. That entry’s proposal for individual meal costs was less than that proposed by the county’s current jail food vendor, but not after they added $575 a day for labor.
Frantz ran the numbers for the current provider’s 4.5% increase. Figuring 33 people in custody per day means 100 meals a day, or 36,500 meals a year, at the new rate of $7.25 per meal, that comes out to $264,625. Add roughly $19,900 in tax and you get an annual food cost of roughly $284,770.
“I’m budgeted for $165,000,” he told commissioners, “which leaves me about $119,770 shy."
Asked if some jails do food service, Frantz replied they do, but that requires more staff and dealing with sometimes tricky and expensive dietary requirements.
One option they’re exploring after July 1 is a program offered by the State Department of Corrections.
“There are some intricacies,” he said. “They come in frozen and we have to re-therm them."
On a happier note, he shared a tribute to people we don't often pay attention to.
"In 1984, President Reagan declared the first week of May National Corrections Officers Week,” he said. “In 1996, Congress amended that to Correctional Worker Week, where we acknowledge all the correctional workers and all the hard work that they do. I want to thank the men and women who worked so hard for the Klickitat County Jail. They're an amazing great group of people to work with."
Under the consent agenda, commissioners approved:
• A health facility agreement with Columbia Basin College.
• A request for proposal for the Solid and Hazardous Waste Management Plan.
• Consideration of approval of short plat SPL 2024-29, Fahlenkamp.
• A consultant agreement with Skillings, Inc. for on-call Environmental Services.
• Supplemental agreement #4 with Applied Archaeological Research, Inc. for on-call archaeological services.
• Advertisement for a public hearing on the Dallesport sewer rate increase for the period of June 1, 2025 – May 31, 2026.
• Phase I - design and bidding engineering design and bidding services Connect Oregon No. C09-006 task order #1 for new aircraft T-hangars at the City of The Dalles/Klickitat County Columbia Gorge Regional Airport.
• Consolidated contract amendment #4 for the Klickitat County Health Department 2025-2027.
• Fire Districts 2, 4, 7, 10 & 12 radio system use and 9-1-1/dispatch services agreements.
• Appointment of District 4 director to the Noxious Weed Control Board.
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