Oklahoma County officials fight over sheriff ’s funding
Acting Oklahoma County Sheriff P.D. Taylor is lashing out at four other county officials who voted Thursday not to give him any extra funding to operate the overcrowded, moldinfested jail next fiscal year.
“I’m devastated. I’m slapped in the face,” Taylor said. “This was a conspiracy to do this.”
County officials voted 4-3 against giving the sheriff’s office $803,377 more next fiscal year from the county general fund. More than half was to cover an increase in inmate medical costs.
Instead, most of that money went to the court clerk and county clerk.
“The message they’re sending to me is that they want to put me in a position to fail,” Taylor said. “I’m worried about being able to run this operation and pay our bills.”
Voting against the extra funding were County Commissioner Brian Maughan, Court Clerk Rick Warren, County Clerk David Hooten and Chief Deputy Assessor
Larry Stein.
All four defended their decision Friday.
Maughan, who is running for mayor of Oklahoma City, said it was high time to finally hold the line on the sheriff’s budget.
“It’s been growing every year for 21 years at the cost of every other department and elected official’s budget,” Maughan said. “He didn’t get a cut. He was just given the same budget, that is something the commissioners ... have been expected to do year after year routinely. Live within our means.”
Voting for the extra funding were County Commissioner Ray Vaughn, County Treasurer Butch Freeman and County Commissioner Willa Johnson.
“I have been here a long time,” Freeman said afterward. “I would have to say this is the most disappointing budget that I have seen here in my years.”
Taylor did not get to vote himself because he is only acting sheriff. A 4-4 vote would have given the sheriff’s office the increase.
The fiscal year begins July 1.
County officials can take up budget issues again in September and could give the sheriff’s office the extra funding then. “It never seems to happen,” Taylor said.
The sheriff’s office relies mostly on the general fund to operate. It also gets millions of dollars from other “special” sources, such as payments from the Corrections Department.
The general fund consists mostly of property tax collections and grows every year. The key special funding sources relied on by the sheriff’s office have shrunk drastically.
At issue Thursday was a recommendation that the sheriff’s office get $35,071,149 next fiscal year, an increase of $803,377 from the current fiscal year.
Instead, the 4-3 vote kept the sheriff’s office share of the general fund the same. That vote also gave $353,389 more from the general fund to the court clerk, $250,000 more to the county clerk and $99,987 more to Maughan’s office.
“The less that they give us, the more they have. That’s the bottom line,” Taylor said. “They appear to be soft on crime.”
The acting sheriff called the four officials who voted against the increase “prima donnas.” He specifically accused the four of trying to force him to abolish his patrol division and use the savings on the jail.
Taylor called on the 30,000 residents in the unincorporated areas of the county served by patrol deputies to complain directly to the four officials. He plans to hold a series of public safety meetings, starting next Thursday night at Deer Creek High School.
“They better wake up and see what’s going on here,” he said of the residents. “We’re their protection.”
He said the patrol division already has been cut to “bare bones.”
Commissioners Vaughn and Johnson called what happened Thursday frustrating and unexpected.
“We have a process in place — a budget evaluation team,” Vaughn said. “These guys spend hours on hours ... vetting every request and they do wonderful work and they come up with a recommendation that’s a consensus ... which in the past has been fairly routinely followed.”
Both the court clerk, Warren, and the chief deputy assessor, Stein suggested the sheriff’s office will have enough in special funds to cover any increase.
“I think he thought it was an attack and it wasn’t,” Warren said. “I was not saying, ‘No.’ I was saying, ‘Not now.’ We don’t have all the information in. We need to wait and see . ... I need to see some of his special revenue funds.”
Stein pointed out the sheriff’s share of the general fund has increased nearly 227 percent in 20 years, more than any other office. “If you want to give the sheriff every penny out of the budget, they’ll take it, but we’ve got other duties around this building,” he said. “We’ve got to stop somewhere.”
Stein specifically questioned why the sheriff’s office needs 30 community service officers and why the $1.1 million in special funds spent on them can’t go elsewhere.
Stein acknowledged that he questions if patrol officers are needed, saying other law enforcement agencies can respond to calls in the county’s unincorporated areas. “Everyone of those employees in a car is a risk . ... They could be injured. There could be a workers’ compensation issue, and we’re exposing ourselves to those risks, risks that the county can’t afford,” he said.
Hooten gave a different reason for voting against the increase. He said the county needs to build a new jail now, not waste more taxpayer money on the existing jail.
“Let’s fix what the problem really is and not put a Band-Aid on it for another $800,000,” Hooten said. “Don’t you see that every time we give them a little more money to keep it Band-Aided and put together where it’s barely functioning ... we’re just doing the taxpayers a disservice by just spending good money after bad?”
Hooten said he supports Taylor “a thousand percent.”