After a two-year review, the Iowa Utilities Board is forcing companies that provide phone service for county jail inmates to lower rates from as high as $1 a minute to a quarter or less.
Once all the new tariffs are approved, the savings to Iowa families with jailed loved ones is expected to be more than $1 million a year, according to the Prison Policy Initiative, a national nonprofit advocacy group that has been working in Iowa and other states to lower jail phone costs.
“I am sure the inmates and the families will be very happy with this change,” said Bremer County Sheriff Dan Pickett. “They will be able to talk to their families longer and make more calls to talk to them.”
The former students did not seek any monetary awards for themselves. They sought and received a judge s order that practices at the school be changed.
The plaintiffs lawyers included attorneys from Disability Rights Iowa, a federally sanctioned agency that represents people with disabilities. The agency declined comment Friday on the judge s ruling on fees. The plaintiffs lawyers also included attorneys from the national group Children s Rights Inc. and from the law firm Ropes & Gray.
Last year, Rose ordered that a monitor ensure the Department of Human Services made the required changes, including halting use of the wrap.
The school s longtime superintendent, Mark Day, retired in May 2020 after trying in vain to defend the institution s practices in court. He was replaced in August by Wendy Leiker, who formerly was a juvenile corrections official in Kansas.