A budget compromise by the Mississippi Legislature will apparently prevent the hole in Lauderdale County's finances from getting bigger.

The compromise will allow counties to continue getting reimbursement from the state for housing state inmates, at lease for a few more months.

"It's my understanding that MDOC has received an additional $16 million, which is going to help us receive funding at least through the end of this fiscal year, which is June," said Lauderdale County Sheriff Billy Sollie..

For Lauderdale County, it would have been an issue of replacing all of the inmate labor with paid employees, along with losing the hundreds of thousands of dollars the state pays the county to keep them.

And according to Sollie, what may have seemed like an immediate fix for the state would have actually added to the expense for taxpayers.

While doing work at county jails, the trusties are actually working time off their sentences. Without that ability they would stay in the prison system longer at your expense.

"For every day that inmate is here working, they are getting a day taken off their sentence," said Sollie. "So that is saving all taxpayers in the end. And they will have a trade under their belt they learned in the county."

Plus, the goal is to rehabilitate these non-violent offenders to get them out of the system as soon as possible. History shows working as a trusty goes further in that mission than being locked up the entire time.

"We think having them do manual labor and being compensated is a motivating factor down the road," the sheriff said.

And while this budget compromise offers short term relief, the sheriff imagines it won't be long before this becomes an issue again.