The Pulaski County Quorum Court on Thursday approved all five of the sheriff’s office budgets and moved the vote on a steep budget increase request from the assessor’s office until Tuesday to verify the request’s impact on the general fund.
County Assessor Janet Ward, who has been in her position for 14 years, requested a $551,354 increase to the budget for 15 new vehicles and technology for a disaster recovery plan.
Ward said all of her office’s 29 vehicles have more than 200,000 miles on them and that they wouldn’t be safe to drive for much longer. She also said that her office is more behind on some of the disaster recovery planning than other offices that have already backed up their files in case of emergency.
Ninety-two percent of the assessor’s office budget, requested at $6.1 million, comes from the school districts and 8 percent comes from the general fund.
Even so, $44,108 would come from the general fund. District 8 Justice of the Peace Curtis Keith, a Democrat, worried that approving the $44,108 could affect other budget requests to come.
District 13 Justice of the Peace Phil Stowers, a Republican, said he thought that with the scale of the request and the absence Thursday night of the county’s comptroller, Mike Hutchens, to explain the impact on the general fund, the Quorum Court should hold off on approving the budget.
Budget Committee Chairman Bob Johnson, a Democrat from District 11, said the Quorum Court would ask Ward questions while she was present Thursday but that it would hold off voting until the next budget hearings on Tuesday.
The Quorum Court also voted 8-0 to approve all five budgets from the sheriff’s office, which were all at about the same level as last year, including $20.8 million for the jail, $9.7 million for law enforcement and $4.1 million for jail medical services.
Sheriff Doc Holladay said the jail budget would not include any money for the 160beds at the jail that remain unfunded and unoccupied. The county would continue to contribute its $320,000 toward the 80 beds opened up this year with $544,000 in contributions from the county’s five major cities: Little Rock, North Little Rock, Jacksonville, Maumelle and Sherwood.
Holladay told the Quorum Court he expected the cities to contribute that same amount for next year to keep those beds open.
Holladay said in an interview that opening the remaining beds would cost as much as $4 million.
The county’s projected revenue this year is about $64 million, about the same amount of money requested in county budgets this year.
Stowers asked Holladay if the number of deputies patrolling the unincorporated areas in the county was as large as it was before budget cuts in 2005.
Holladay said the sheriff’s office was still dealing with some turnover. The sheriff’s office has 10 fewer deputies than in 2005.
“We’re managing, but we’re not where we were in 2005,” Holladay said.
Holladay also told the Quorum Court that the jail has been over capacity by an average of 24 inmates every day this month.
The jail’s capacity is 1,210 inmates.
Holladay said about onefourth of the inmates held in the jail were held for the state prison system.
More than 200 of those inmates Thursday morning were parole violators and parole holds without any local charges, a population that jail administrator Randy Morgan said the jail hasn’t had to deal with before recent concerns with the state’s parole system came to light. The state ordinarily pays $28 per day for inmates held for state charges but has not paid what Morgan and Holladay estimated to be several thousand dollars for parole violators and parole holds.
Holladay told the Quorum Court that the jail would continue to accept inmates from the state.
“They understand our dilemma,” Holladay said. “They have a dilemma … they’re doing what they can.”
Holladay said in an interview that he expects negotiations for funding the remaining 160 beds to be part of renegotiations for the current interlocal agreement to fund the jail, which expires in October 2014. Holladay, who has repeatedly stressed the need for cities to contribute more to funding the jail, said he expects negotiations between city and county leaders to begin in January.
The Quorum Court budget committee also approved budgets for the circuit/county clerk, circuit clerk recorder, board of equalization and the second, 12th and 14th divisions of the Pulaski County Circuit Court.
Arkansas, Pages 10 on 10/25/2013