Spokane may backfill insolvent jail fund despite $13.4M general fund shortfall

(The Center Square) – Sitting on another unpaid jail bill, the city of Spokane may backfill the account responsible for covering its costs from the general fund despite an approximately $13.4 million deficit.

Chief Financial Officer Matt Boston told the Spokane City Council on Monday that the Criminal Justice Assistance Fund is now insolvent. Established in 2007, city officials initially planned to use the fund to pay the monthly jail bills from the county, but recently drained the account with one-time transfers.

As originally reported by The Center Square, the city diverted over $6 million from the jail fund during the pandemic, decimating reserves by approximately 50% from 2022 to 2023. Budget staff claims the city’s costs are rising disproportionately compared to the county’s, but data paints a different picture.

Taxpayers from unincorporated areas of Spokane County already foot the bill for nearly 2,500 felony offenders arrested within city limits. The city also logged 21.8% more total inmate days in 2024 than when the pandemic started in 2019, while the county’s share of inmate days is still 9% less than then.

“This is something that we’ve talked about at length over the last several months,” Boston told the city council on Monday. “Not only do we have to find the delta to house the expenses that are specific to jail costs, but we also have to find a funding source for the other expenses that were in there.”

The city also used the CJA fund for other one-time transfers related to law enforcement from 2020 to 2025, totaling $6.7 million in addition to the more than $6 million diverted for homelessness services.

Those one-time transfers kept departments relying on the general fund afloat during several years of deficits under former Mayor Nadine Wooward and now Mayor Lisa Brown. While Brown inherited a $25 million shortfall that her new administration balanced in 2024, she now faces a $13.4 million deficit.

Boston and Brown have both recognized that a tough budget cycle with some significant cuts is ahead.

The $13.4 million deficit is an imbalance between revenues and expenditures next year, so the city is on track for the most part through 2025. Communications Director Erin Hut told The Center Square that a $2 million transfer from the general fund should keep the CJA account afloat through next year.

Boston said the issue is that declining sales tax revenue growth hasn’t kept pace with projections over the last few years. The CJA fund may have stabilized had growth matched the city’s rising costs, but it plateaued after the city drained its reserves, leaving no other option than to backfill the jail account.

“Based on our estimations and the current billing and [Average Daily Population] reports,” Hut told The Center Square, “We’re anticipating there will be just enough to get us through the end of the year.”

Spokane County Spokesperson Pat Bell told The Center Square that the city still hasn’t paid its August jail bill. Detention Services hadn’t received payments for the June and July bills until Aug. 8, a week after The Center Square’s initial coverage, and sent the city another bill for this month on Aug. 5.

Hut said the city usually pays its bill at the end of the month once it receives another chunk of sales tax revenue; however, Spokane also waited until the end of July to pay the county for the June bill.

“This fund’s cash balance has reached insolvency, wherein the sales tax collected is not enough to pay the monthly allocated bill from the county,” according to the council’s committee meeting agenda. “The Criminal Justice Assistance Fund needs an influx of funding to survive 2025, let alone future years.”

The council is expected to vote on the $2 million transfer to backfill the CJA fund with the general fund by the end of September.