At a tentative budget hearing on Sept. 10, Indian River County commissioners put an end to an ongoing feud between the board and County Sheriff Eric Flowers.
Commissioners voted to grant the sheriff's office a $6.8 million budget increase, far shy of Flower's requested $12.2 million. The sheriff's office’s new budget totals $87.7 million. The increase, Flowers said, would go to making the starting salaries for its roughly 560 employees more competitive.
Flowers could not make the meeting due to dealing with an important unrelated matter.
Flescher opened discussion that night to share his belief that they grant the sheriff his budget through the reserves.
"We should take that additional six million dollars, and put it back into the general fund, and fully fund the budget request by the sheriff at his amount through the reserve account," he said.
There are $685 million in encumbered funds in the reserve account. The funds, Flescher said, are restricted to certain areas. There is $78 million in unencumbered funds.
Commissioner Susan Adams clarified that Flescher is requesting a motion which would put back the $6 million which was allocated to the sheriff back into the general fund, and then they would take the requested $12.2 million out of the reserves and award that money to Flowers.
"This is a very unique situation and I felt it resolves most of the concerns. Most certainly after yesterday's actions, I felt compelled," Flescher said, in reference to the county administrator's and attorney's contract amendments.
Members of the public were then asked to come forward to voice their opinion.
One woman spoke in opposition to the sheriff receiving the increasing, alleging a lack of service.
"I want to know if he is going to do his job," she said.
On the other end of the spectrum, Michael Marsh, another Indian River County resident, commended the service of the sheriff's office.
"I've seen this sheriff's department in the trenches day in and day out," he said. "I think it's really simple, county commissioners: we need to fund Sheriff Flowers' budget."
Renee Raya, who works at the sheriff's office, also took the dais to voice her thoughts.
"From the last time that we came, I have lost an employee because of pay," she said. "If we don't approve this budget, who is going to be to blame when we lose these people and people call 911 and no one answers?"
Flescher took over after public comment.
"It was brought up on the public discussion that there are deputies that are leaving," he said. "We do have some record of some, but not many. But guess what? We have 67 counties and we have all heard in the conferences we've gone to, and what we hear from the sheriff's association and what we hear from many of our colleagues serving in other counties — this is a statewide challenge."
The commission chair also emphasized that when looking at the salary of deputies in other areas, to consider the cost of living, as Indian River County's is relatively low.
County Administrator John Titkanich voiced some concern with tapping into the reserves for the sheriff's budget, citing property values going down as well as Florida legislature pushing for property tax reform.
"If they force a rollback, how do you rollback and then increase to make up for the money you are taking out of reserves this year, to cover not just one year expenses, but two years expenses?" he asked. "I would just caution you on trying to balance a budget with recurring expenses at a fund balance when there's only $15.2 million dollars truly available."
Titkanich once again presented what it would cost to increase the salaries of both deputies and civilian employees to the amounts which Flowers requested, which totals roughly $6.1 million.
Commissioner Joseph Earman strongly voiced his opposition to dipping into the reserves, and also condemned what he says was a lack of amicability from Flowers.
"It's a bad practice to dip into your reserves, unless its an emergency capital project" he said.
Commission Vice Chair Deryl Loar also opposed tapping into the reserves. He proposed an idea that they award the sheriff $6.8 million to address deputy salaries, with openness to future amendments.
To get to that number, the county would have to make $850,000 in cuts from other departments.
A motion was filed, which passed. On the matter, Flescher remarked his disappointment.
"I was hoping we'd get to a better place," he said. "I had greater anticipation, but you have to take what you can get."
The final budget hearing is slated for Sept. 17 at 5 p.m.