It comes down to choices

Coming up this Tuesday At 6:30pm is next F&A Committee Meeting and although it isn't listed on the official agenda we have been told that will be looking at changes to how money is appropriated for the sheriff's office.

At the last meeting of this committee entertained the idea of changing the sheriff's budget to quarterly allocations, pass an ordinance that the sheriff's dept. cannot go in the negative in any single line item, get a report back on who has vehicles and why (there are 51 somewhere), and get a report back on who has cell phones and why. The committee also wants to require the sheriff to get prior approval before spending for meals and lodging and cancel all the credit cards. The committee recognizes that there will be some problems that need to be worked out with these last two ideas but feel all of these steps are needed to correct the spending issues.

These measures are the result of choices the sheriff's office made in the management of the department. Facing a tight budget due to budget cuts in the 2005 budget, because of a surplus at the end of 2004, the department chose to ignore established accounting procedures and run many categories in the red without notifying the Quorum Court.

Once it all came to a head in late November and questions arose by the F&A Committee the sheriff's office was asked to explain their actions. The Committee ultimately had to appropriate additional monies and once again the sheriff's office didn't follow the correct procedure by running more line items in the red. This time the sheriff's office made another choice, they choose to ignore the F&A Committee's request for answers.

Speaking of choices, comments recently were made at this blog concerning raises for deputies and apparently the posters feel the problem is at the Quorum Court level. But the fact is it is another choice made by the sheriff and his management team.

The Sheriff is responsible for setting the budget for his department not the Quorum Court. The court simply approves or sends the budget back fro adjustments if it can't be done. Over the years Sheriff Montgomery chose to use his budget to fund trips to sheriff's conferences and a special FBI course for his political and professional career rather that spend money on raises. Montgomery also used this travel budget to take non-county personnel on these outings. If we were deputies we'd be a little pissed at this choice. It is choices like these that call for a new sheriff and management team.

In November the people will get to decide the route our sheriff's department takes. We recently asked one of the candidates for Sheriff what his view on this problem was. Democratic candidate Karl Byrd responded,

A lot of these problems will be easy to fix by simply putting the needed checks and balances in place and re-structuring administration and who is allowed to spend and under what circumstances. You must have set procedures and proper supervision to assure these practices are being followed. To restore the public's view of the department will take some time, hard work, and a lot of professionalism that will be best displayed by sound law enforcement, understanding of the laws, and dealing with the public in a fair and professional manner.

I do believe that I will be able to obtain raises for the deputies and hopefully more of them to better serve the public. I believe this can be done by establishing an open communication with the JP's and explain the needs of the department and the services required to keep our citizens safe. In this day and time, you just can't ask for money from the court and not provide information as to why you need it.

This is an exciting time in Faulkner County with the rapid growth in population, business, and industry, but we need to understand problems that can come with this rapid growth and that we MUST have a progressive law enforcement agency to be prepared for this.

This is probably going to be one of the most important elections that Faulkner County has ever experienced. Not just in my race, but also in the Judge's race, Representative races, and JP's. I hope that the citizens of this County consider these facts and ask questions as you have done before they cast their votes. . .

We agree wholeheartedly with Candidate Byrd on this matter, this will be a very important election for all the races in the county. . .