DES MOINES – State Auditor Mary Mosiman on Friday released a combined report on the institutions under the control of the Iowa Department of Corrections, which includes findings and recommendations and average cost per inmate information for the five years ended June 30, 2014.
The average cost per inmate at the nine institutions under the control of the Iowa Department of Corrections ranged from $21,294 at the North Central Correctional Facility – Rockwell City to $57,869 at the Iowa State Penitentiary – Fort Madison for the year ended June 30, 2014.
General Fund expenditures for the nine institutions totaled approximately $276 million for the year ended June 30, 2014, an increase of approximately $5.5 million, or 2%, from the year ended June 30, 2013. General Fund expenditures increased 6% during the five year period ended June 30, 2014.
The average daily cost per inmate of $92.61 for the year ended June 30, 2014 was 8.9% more than the average daily cost per inmate of $85.01 for the year ended June 30, 2010. The average number of inmates decreased 2.7% over the five year period, from 8,384 for the year ended June 30, 2010 to 8,160 for the year ended June 30, 2014.
A copy of the report is available for review in the Office of Auditor of State and on the Auditor of State’s web site, here.
DES MOINES — The state auditor’s review of Iowa’s prison system finds the average cost of keeping an inmate behind bars has gone up nearly nine percent in the past five years. The yearly cost for keeping an inmate in the state’s maximum security prison in Fort Madison was nearly 58-thousand dollars in 2014. It cost far less — about 21-thousand dollars — to keep one inmate for a year in the minimum security prison in Rockwell City. The state has six other prison facilities in Anamosa, Clarinda, Fort Dodge, Mitchellville, Mount Pleasant and Newton. The state prison hospital and intake center for inmates is located in Oakdale. The number of inmates in the state prison declined by two-point-seven percent from the middle of 2010 through June of 2014. The number of employees in the nine prisons declined by more than seven percent during that time frame. Click here to view the auditor’s report. It breaks out inmate and employee data for each of the state’s nine prison facilities.
