BY MARK J. CRAWFORD
Telegraph Editor
STARKE — Bradford County Sheriff Gordon Smith is fighting for a larger budget to cover rising costs and provide line staff a $1 hourly raise.
Smith sent out an updated cover letter to 2021-22 budget request that provides some details of the nearly $7.1 million budget. More than $500,000 of that is new money, which he said includes increases in liability insurance, inmate medical insurance and meals, state retirement rates, fuel prices, and automobile insurance.
It also includes more money to pay employees, who are being poached by agencies that can afford to pay more.
According to Smith, he has lost more than 20 deputies and other staff members since June. They tried to compete by being creative, but they can only do so much, he said.
“The proposed budget includes cost savings and reductions where operationally feasible and directs resources to our agency’s greatest challenge, retention of our highly trained and qualified deputies,” Smith wrote. Since taking office in 2009, he said his employees have only received two salary increases, which he called marginal. Only one was funded by the county commission. The other was funded by internal cost reductions.
“However, you can only pull so many rabbits out of the hat before it further perpetuates compression and places existing members of the organization significantly behind market compensation,” Smith wrote. “Our greatest need currently is to both attract and retain quality personnel while maintaining our high standards. Continued anticipated turnover, as well as a diminishing applicant pool resulting from societal influences, expanded job requirements and an increasingly competitive market, are important considerations to the agency’s overall competitive positioning. Keeping well-trained deputies to address increased demands for service is an important investment in our human capital.”
Smith touted the results of that investment, pointing to a 57% decrease in the crime rate since he took office. He also pointed out the many areas of responsibility his agency covers, including law enforcement, correction and detention, court security, support services for the other constitutional offices, emergency management, countywide communications, and animal control.
The maintenance of the county-owned facilities that he manages has not cost the commission as those expenses are covered by inmate housing revenue generated by the jail.
While he said the sheriff’s office shares the commission’s commitment to protecting the general fund balance and applying a conservative budget philosophy, Smith also pointed out that his deputy sheriffs are some of the lowest paid public safety employees in the county.
“Reducing crime and the fear of crime while enhancing the quality of life remains our foremost priority,” he wrote.
The requested increases come at a time when the county commission is tentatively considering a tax increase and exploring other ways to raise revenue for public safety services. Commissioners pointed out in their budget meeting Sept. 16 that their own employees haven’t had a raise in six years, and they have just turned down requests to increase compensation and other benefits for paramedics, EMTs and firefighters.
Smith told commissioners the reason many his employees showed up at the budget hearing was to make sure they were not forgotten, pointing out that unionized public safety employees have been able to negotiate for higher wages in the past 13 years.
Unlike firefighting, he reminded them, they have a constitutional responsibility to fund law enforcement.
