Cobb County commissioners voted 4-0 on Tuesday, Sept. 8, to release $4.5 million for inmate care at the county jail. The money had been withheld for months over concerns about sheriff's office spending.

The funds, drawn from the county's fund balance, will boost the Adult Detention Center's medical and mental health services contract by $2,438,804 and its meal services contract by $2,061,196, according to the Marietta Daily Journal, which first reported the vote. Commissioner Erick Allen was absent.

East Cobb residents, whose county taxes help fund detention center operations, will feel the budget impact. Commissioner Keli Gambrill told the Marietta Daily Journal the spending was necessary to keep inmates healthy and safe but said it pushes the county beyond its balanced budget.

"When we approved the budget, it was a balanced budget, which means all the money we collected has been essentially dedicated for some type of funding," Gambrill said.

She said the county finance department has put protections in place so the $4.5 million can only go toward inmate medical and food services and cannot be shifted to other sheriff's office accounts.

Sheriff Craig Owens had originally requested the funding as part of the county's $1.41 billion fiscal year 2026 budget. Commissioners held it back after questioning whether his office was overspending. The county's adopted FY2026 sheriff's budget was about $133.1 million, according to county budget documents.

David Jones, chief of staff for the sheriff's office, told commissioners that costs to feed and care for inmates have climbed year over year. Owens blamed inflation and a growing need for mental health treatment, telling the Marietta Daily Journal that the detention center has "a lot more patients now than 10, 15 years ago."

The detention center booked 5,102 inmates in the last quarter of 2024 and 4,423 in the second quarter of 2025, according to sheriff's office quarterly reports.

The spending tension is not new. In June 2025, Gambrill said Owens was not "as respectful to the county budget as others" during a meeting where his office sought $1.7 million to replace the HVAC system in the detention center's infirmary. She also criticized a request to raise salaries for top deputies earlier in 2026.

A separate agenda item that would have increased pay for the sheriff's top deputies was pulled from Tuesday's