He said some counties have 200 prisoners on ankle monitors, but he would want to start out with a more manageable number, maybe 25, and he would need to hire people to handle the 24/7 program.
Jones estimated it would cost $5 a day — $1,825 a year — per prisoner to rent monitors.
Butler County Common Pleas Court has some monitors — including ones that detect if someone ordered not to drink alcohol takes a sip or if someone on house arrest leaves a certain area — but the program is not used much, according to Court Administrator Wayne Gilkison.
Gilkison said the judges fully support the sheriff running a monitoring system.
“It’ll afford the county as a whole another option for supervising people that get released from the jail that we don’t have right now,” he said.
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