Venango County Sheriff Eric Foy has sued the county’s board of commissioners, arguing they had no legal authority to dissolve the county prison board and then saddle him with the warden’s job on top of his elected duties. Foy is not asking for money — he wants a judge to simply declare the commissioners’ move illegal.
The lawsuit, filed in Venango County Court of Common Pleas, names the Venango County Board of Commissioners and the Board of Inspectors of the County Prison as defendants, according to explorevenango.com. Foy’s complaint reportedly specifies that the prison board was named only to satisfy requirements of the Declaratory Judgment Act, and it does not accuse the board’s noncommissioner members of any wrongdoing. The board itself did not vote to dissolve itself — that decision belonged solely to the three county commissioners.
At the center of the case is an August 11 vote by Commissioners Sam Breene, Ken Bryan, and Tim Heffernan to eliminate the prison board altogether, a body Foy had been serving as president of before the change. Foy’s suit asks a judge to declare that vote invalid from the outset, arguing, per his attorneys, that while state law lets sixth-class counties like Venango establish prison boards by commissioners’ resolution, it contains no provision letting commissioners dissolve one unilaterally. His lawyers contend that authority over prison governance and management rests with an established board, not the commissioners alone.
A Second Full-Time Job for $2,000 a Year
Beyond the dissolution itself, Foy is challenging the commissioners’ decision to make him the prison’s warden while he continues serving as sheriff — for an additional $2,000 a year. His complaint argues that requiring him to perform two full-time jobs effectively reduces his pay, noting that previous full-time wardens earned more annually than his current sheriff’s salary alone. Foy began his current term in January and is set to serve through December 2029.
The warden’s job is no small addition: the position involves supervising about 35 employees, overseeing inmate medical care and food services, and managing facility security, maintenance, and upgrades, the report states. Foy’s attorneys also argue the warden role comes with a housing benefit — a prison residence — though the county reportedly has no appropriate residence available for Foy or a subordinate to actually use.
Foy contends that stacking these duties and benefits onto him mid-term runs afoul of the Pennsylvania Constitution. Article III, Section 27 of the state constitution prohibits increasing or diminishing a public officer’s salary or benefits after election or appointment, according to the Pennsylvania General Assembly. Foy argues the warden arrangement — and the housing benefit tied to it — both violate that same provision.
Foy Says He Was Never Asked
Foy alleges the commissioners never consulted him or asked whether he was even willing to serve as warden before they voted, and he says the proposal was never discussed at a public prison board meeting. He is represented by attorneys Thomas E. Breth and Thomas W. King III of Dillon McCandless King Coulter & Graham LLP, the same report notes.
Foy said Deputy Warden Anthony Faraone had been serving as acting warden after the prison’s previous warden, Jason Batykefer, departed and before the commissioners’ vote took place. Despite the legal fight, Foy maintains that prison operations are continuing normally in the meantime.
A Revolving Door in the Warden’s Office
The lawsuit lands against a backdrop of persistent turnover atop the Venango County Prison. Batykefer, hired in February, was relieved of his duties on July 29 after roughly six months on the job — a departure first reported when explorevenango.com noted Faraone had stepped in as acting warden while the prison board weighed its next move.
Accounts of just how long that turnover has been going on differ slightly. One explorevenango.com report states that longtime warden Jeffrey Ruditis retired in 2020, after which the prison cycled through a series of permanent, acting, and interim wardens. A separate account from thederrick.com places Ruditis’s retirement in late 2019 and says Batykefer was the eighth person to hold the warden post since then. Both reports agree on the underlying pattern, even if the exact starting point differs.
That churn has coincided with strain inside the jail itself. The facility has capacity for 174 inmates and averaged 149 inmates per day this year, according to Foy’s complaint as cited by explorevenango.com. Thederrick.com has separately reported the jail down nine corrections officers, with only 22 on staff against a full complement of 31, and described a population surge that saw Foy say, “We haven’t had numbers this high in a long time. It is concerning.”
The commissioners did not return calls seeking comment on the lawsuit, according to the report. For now, the case leaves open whether a judge will side with Foy’s reading of state law and the state constitution, or with the commissioners’ authority to restructure how the county’s only prison is run.
