Governor Rick Scott signed a bill Tuesday aimed at ending a decades-long fight over juvenile detention costs. Starting in 2004, the Legislature required counties to pay a majority of detention costs. Counties have disputed the billing system ever since. Cragin Mosteller with the Florida Association of Counties says the move will put an end to the litigation.
“In ten years, counties never received an accurate bill. You can imagine, just thinking about the bills that you receive, if you never got one that was correct you’d constantly be arguing to try to pay the correct amount. And that’s what’s been happening between the counties and the state. And today all of that comes to an end,” she said.
Senator Jack Latvala of Clearwater is behind the measure, which will split juvenile detention costs 50-50 between the state and counties.
