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Penobscot County draft seeks $8 million from governor for jail costs, plans legislative visits to Augusta

Penobscot County Commission Workshop · February 13, 2026

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Summary

County leaders discussed a revised letter asking the governor for $8,000,000 tied to jail/corrections funding, prepared supporting fact sheets, and agreed to pursue meetings in Augusta with legislators and appropriations chairs to press the request.

At a Penobscot County commission workshop, commissioners reviewed a revised draft letter to the governor seeking additional funding to address county corrections costs and infrastructure strains.

Speaker 2 summarized the draft and said the commission was "requesting $8,000,000 to alleviate the lease on the onboarding cost" the county is forecasting. The draft, as described in the meeting, also "includes the 2,000,000 per per annum for previous 3 years" (language used in the transcript). Speaker 2 linked the request to county corrections funding and asked for the commission's approval to send the letter and to seek a meeting with the governor to discuss the matter.

Speaker 1 explained why the county had drawn on reserve funds, saying state statutory limits on property-tax increases constrained local revenue and contributed to a tax-rate increase this year. Speaker 2 said staff had prepared fact sheets to accompany the letter and noted the draft was informed by discussions among the executive committee of the FCCA and LPC chairs. Commissioners agreed to revise the letter and circulate it for final review, with administrative execution via DocuSign if appropriate.

Speaker 2 also announced a supplemental budget hearing for corrections scheduled for 10 a.m. on Wednesday (referred to in the transcript as the "20 fifth") and proposed that some commissioners and affected county employees travel to Augusta to meet legislators and present the county's case in person. The commission discussed adjusting its meeting schedule so members could attend the Augusta hearings.

The transcript does not record a formal vote to send the letter in this workshop; commissioners agreed to revise and circulate the draft for approval. The transcript contains inconsistent transcriptions of dates and some figures; where the meeting transcript uses ambiguous phrasing the article reports the text as spoken rather than substituting unconfirmed dates or external references.