During a meeting Wednesday, after a lengthy executive session, the Schuylkill County Prison Board fired full-time corrections officer Patricia Pancerella. Officials did not comment on the termination.

Pancerella was hired as part-time in 2018 and promoted to full-time in July 2019, at a salary of $22.34 per hour.

After the unanimous vote to terminate Pancerella, the board voted to move CO Courtney Frye from part-time to full-time status. When at full staff, the county prison has 45 full-time officers and 15 part-time officers; currently there are openings for 10 part-time officers. During the board’s regular meeting, part-time CO Taylor Holiday was moved to full-time status.

In December 2019 the Schuylkill County Prison Board fired part-time corrections officer Pamela Smith. Two full-time officers were fired during the year, Keith Wittig in January and Kyle Jones in March. On March 27, the county rescinded Jones’ termination and changed it to a resignation.

Prison Warden Eugene Berdanier released the prison statistics for December 2019, as well as the year-end totals:

In December, the peak census was 270 with an average number of 247 (191 male and 55 female). The average number of outsourced inmates was 90. Currently, there are 70 inmates outsourced (housed in other county prisons due to overcrowding at Schuylkill Prison).

For 2019, the total intakes were 3,097 and total discharges were 3,055. The average length of stay for an inmate in Schuylkill County Prison is 29 days; if the number of inmates housed in other county prisons is factored into those numbers, the average length of stay is 38.5 days.

The total number of inmates detoxed during 2019 was 546. There were 253 in-house EKGs performed and 156 in-house X-rays.

Revenue from the work-release program was $1,464 in December, and $29,810 for 2019.