Sheriff is more than $1 mil over OT budget

And it's early in fiscal year; on pace for $14 mil overrun
Michael Kiefer and Yvonne Wingett
The Arizona Republic
Nov. 6, 2007 12:00 AM
http://www.azcentral.com

The Maricopa County Sheriff's Office has already exceeded part of its budget by more than $1 million - just four months into the fiscal year.

Officials have already spent more on overtime in the first months of the fiscal year than they were to spend for its entirety. The impact of that spending played out in court Monday when there were not enough overtime funds to adequately staff the court.

As a result, sheriff's deputies failed to transport 46 jail inmates to their court appearances and some courts lacked deputies to take defendants into custody. advertisement


A Superior Court judge called two Sheriff's Office chiefs into court to ask why.

Their answer: It was simply a mistake.

But the "mistake" came on the heels of a memo sent Friday by sheriff's personnel saying that, because of budgetary constraints, the office would no longer "service" certain courts or transport prisoners to certain hearings, even though they are required to do so by state law.

"If the sheriff and the budget people have differences of opinion, we are not allowed to enter into that," presiding Criminal Judge Anna Baca said.

During the day, sheriff's personnel told judges the staffing shortage could continue.

"I'm telling you right now that I don't want any (courtrooms) impacted," she said.

She threatened the Sheriff's Office Chiefs Gerard Sheridan and Brian Sands with contempt of court if her order is not obeyed.

"The court has a constitutional duty to protect the public and to deliver justice to victims, families, children and those accused of committing a crime," presiding Judge Barbara Rodriguez Mundell said in a prepared statement.

"The failure to transport inmates to courtrooms affects the timely resolution of criminal cases and deprives victims of their rights. It also causes significant delays to jurors who are waiting to serve on criminal trials. It impacts the rights of families to have their custody and child-support issues resolved.

Her statement continued, "Suspending inmate transportation services to the courts is a misguided policy that directly impedes the courts' ability to provide timely, fair and impartial justice to the community.


A 'miscommunication'

Friday's memo to Superior Court Administrator Marcus Reinkensmeyer stated strongly that the Sheriff's Office would no longer serve Justice of the Peace Courts, would not transport defendants to non-criminal courts, and would take defendants to immigration status hearings only if they had been arrested by deputies in the first place.

State laws require county sheriffs to transport prisoners and to provide security wherever judges determine there is a risk of danger.

Sheriff Joe Arpaio deferred comment to Sheriff's Office Chief Loretta Barkell. Barkell wrote Friday's memo, which she said was a "miscommunication." What appeared to be unilateral decisions of things the office would no longer do, she said, were merely suggestions that were implemented by mistake.

As a result, 46 defendants involved in 61 cases did not arrive in court.

Eleven judicial officerswere affected, which had a ripple effect throughout the court. In some courtrooms, juries waited up to an hour before they could start trial.

"When we indicated to staff that we were not going to be using overtime, they did not bring in overtime staff to make that coverage," Barkell said.


Overtime costs pile up


Overtime expenses have been a major problem for the Sheriff's Office, which has a total budget of $288 million.

The Sheriff's Office is mostly funded by two sources. The general fund, which primarily pays for law-enforcement patrol, and a jail tax, which pays for detention centers.

Maricopa County operates on a tight budget, and much of it is funded through state shared revenues.

Overspending in any department can cause big problems, especially now that the county's share of state sales-tax revenues are lower than budget officials' forecast, according to figures released last week.

Top county administrators got their first inkling that the Sheriff's Office was busting its overtime budget a few weeks ago, when first-quarter fiscal reports came out. But no one knew how bad it was until they analyzed those reports.

"They're spending more on overtime for the first three or four months of the (fiscal) year than what they have for the allocation for the entire year," Maricopa County Manager David Smith said. "They're spending at a rate that's not sustainable."

So far this fiscal year, the Sheriff's Office has exceeded its total general fund budget by about $1.3 million, according to an internal memo obtained by The Republic through a public-records request.

Most of that overrun is because of overtime spending. About $2.8 million has been spent so far this year, more than four times the budgeted $512,000.

The overspending is mostly happening in enforcement. Officials budgeted about $492,000. They spent more than $2.6 million.

Three areas made up the bulk of the overspending. Officials planned on paying about $102,400 for investigations; about $548,700 was spent. About $148,300 was budgeted for patrol; about $959,800 was spent. And about $131,500 was budgeted for enforcement support and specialized response activities; about $713,300 has been spent.

If overtime spending continues at this pace, the Sheriff's Office will spend about $8.4 million on overtime this fiscal year from the general fund, an overrun of about $6.9 million, the report projected.

About one-third of this overtime pay has been absorbed in other areas where the Sheriff's Office has underspent, such as general supplies, and repairs and maintenance.

Meanwhile, the detention fund's overtime budget is about $3.2 million. Officials have spent about $3.6 million, the report said, mostly on inmate transport and adult-detention management activities.

About $549,600 was spent on transportation for inmates, but about $138,500 was budgeted. About $2 million was spent on adult detention management while $483,300 was budgeted. If the overtime-spending pattern continues, about $10.8 million will be spent, the report projected, an overrun of about $7.6 million.

Even as the Sheriff's Office has filled vacancies, its overtime spending has continued to increase.

"If you're filling your vacancies, your overtime should decrease," Barkell said. "This has not happened. We're examining why. We're going to take care of it."

County budget officials plan to work with the Sheriff's Office to come up with a way to correct the overtime overruns.