Patrol vehicle built in Dec. was just recently delivered
Vehicle supply chain issues and the difficulty of filling some positions has led to budget savings for the Hamilton County Sheriff’s Office as well as other functions under the supervision of Sheriff Jeromy McCoy. He told the county commission in a budget hearing on Monday morning that while his total budget ask is going up by $109,695 for FY 2025/26, various factors are making the actual increase only 3.7 percent, with much of that going to salary increases.
McCoy said he had been scheduled to purchase two new pickups for the office under the previous budget but one of them – although built last December – was not delivered until recently. He said the other vehicle is sitting in a train yard in Missouri and he doesn’t know when he will take delivery on it. McCoy said the purchases were made under a plan to replace two vehicles every two years.
He also said savings from one of his deputies going to part-time had allowed him to hire a part time court security officer to work in the courthouse on court days. He said court staff has been pleased with the arrangement and it frees up his deputies to be on patrol.
He said he plans to keep the security officer on this year and pay for the position using vacancy savings.
McCoy said he had added one line item to his budget for veterinary services to help in the investigation of animal cruelty cases. Noting that his office had investigated several such cases over the past year, McCoy said, “It’s the cost of doing business to investigate these kinds of things.”
He also asked for an increase in the night shift differential for deputies, jailers and dispatchers from the current 50 cents to $1 per hour, noting that those positions are the most difficult to fill.
In presenting his 911 and E911 budgets, McCoy said they would go down by 6 percent and 23 percent respectively due to various changes that had been made in the operation of those services. He also said the state is making it hard for local 911 dispatch centers to survive, noting that they are pushing consolidation of such centers. He said the state wants to phase out local centers and is pushing to have just two in the region located in Grand Island and Columbus.
McCoy said his jail and dispatch expenditures were $85,000 under budget, mostly due to personnel savings due to unfilled vacancies. He said with the dispatch center, more than a quarter of the budget is paid for by interlocals with Merrick County and the Aurora Police Department to provide them with dispatch services.
The sheriff is asking for an increase in the jail’s water budget, noting that the prisoner census has increased over the past two years, partly due to taking in inmates from other nearby counties. He estimates the jail will receive $91,250 in the next fiscal year from housing prisoners from those other counties.
Again noting the difficulty in hiring and retaining qualified dispatchers and jailers, McCoy asked for a 4.7 percent increase in that budget, with most of it going to salary increases. He said he wants to increase the starting wage for jailers to $20 an hour and dispatchers to $19.75.