Individuals needing fingerprinting done at the Carbon County Correctional Facility will see an increase in the cost to complete the service.

On Wednesday, the county prison board, at the recommendation of the warden, voted to increase the fees to $150 for criminal cases and $50 for employment prints. Carbon County has been doing fingerprinting through Livescan for over a decade.

The decision to change the fees came after a lengthy discussion that also included the prison ceasing to collect the fees and have them collected through the clerk of courts office once added onto a person’s court fees and fines.

The discussion about stopping the collection of fees at the prison has been going on for several months after Warden Timothy Fritz approached the board regarding the matter.

He said on Wednesday that a meeting with court administration was held on Dec. 9.

President Judge Roger Nanovic asked several questions about processing fees if the collection would be diverted away from the prison collecting it.

Following the discussion, a second motion to table the matter of which county department would collect the fees was passed. The county plans to speak with the clerk of courts for input in the matter and bring up the item again at the board’s January meeting.

In other prison matters, Sheriff Anthony Harvilla, president of the prison board, said that the prison study, which was to begin in early January, is being delayed until March because of the current pandemic.

During the salary board meeting this month, the board voted 4-1 to create two corrections assessor positions for this study. The two people who will be completing the evaluation will become temporary part-time county employees once the study begins.

Fritz also announced that the work-release program, fingerprinting and weekend sentencing has been suspended as a result of the pandemic until Jan. 8.

The county correctional facility, located on the Broad Mountain in Nesquehoning, currently has 185 inmates.