The Brown County Council has committed to giving all Brown County Sheriff’s Department officers a pay increase. As the council goes into budget hearings next week, now council members have to figure out how to pay for it.

The Brown County Sheriff’s Department has lost seven deputies in the past six years, with most going to nearby departments that pay more.

When the sheriff’s department hires a new deputy, a minimum investment of $65,000 is made into the new hire with training, and that continues to increase each year. That investment leaves when the deputy leaves the county, and could be even larger if that officer is a certified instructor.

With that in mind, the minimum cost of losing seven deputies in six years to the county is $455,000.

“They are able to go to another department at minimum to make $10,000 to $12,000 more a year,” Sheriff Scott Southerland told the council on July 19.

The sheriff’s department also does not receive nearly as many applicants for openings as in years past, and officers believe that pay has something to do with it. “Once we finish our hiring process and a background investigation we’re down to one. We have one person left standing. It was a good hire, but it’s not looking good for the future,” Southerland said.

On July 19, the county council voted to approve a new salary structure for deputies. It is based upon a percentage of the prosecutor’s and judge’s salaries. Approving it means the council will have to find around $120,000 in the budget each year to increase deputies’ pay.

The current base salary for the sheriff’s department is around $43,173. The average salary of police agencies surrounding Brown County is $54,299.

Under the new pay scale, a deputy will be paid $52,784 a year, a sergeant will earn $55,983, a lieutenant will be paid $57,582, and a captain will earn $59,182.

The sheriff’s salary would be $87,972 and the chief deputy’s would be $62,381 under the new plan. The sheriff and chief deputy salaries were already based on 55 percent and 39 percent of the prosecutor’s salary.

Deputies will no longer receive longevity pay or a $1,000 “retention bonus” every three years. Salaries would be based on a 42-hour work week, like they are now.

Southerland said the new pay is “still a little bit behind Johnson County, but I think we’re competitive enough there that we can get recruits and retain the people we are losing.”

The sheriff does not want to lose any more of his skilled staff if he can avoid it by paying them more.

“Our employees are our most valued assets. Their abilities, knowledge and experience either can’t be replaced, or if we do, it’s at a great cost,” he said.

“When lose a deputy it not only costs a lot of money, but it also sets back many years the growth and improvement that we’ve worked so hard to achieve.”

On the roster at the sheriff’s department now are three lie detection operators; six deputies with college degrees; an EMT; a certified death investigator; seven state-certified instructors; a deputy who participates in a federal task force investigating crimes against children; another deputy who participates in a federal joint terrorism task force; and a deputy who is on his way to becoming the seventh person in the state to be certified as a highly trained accident investigator.

Another deputy was trained at Quantico on retrieving evidence from electronic devices. That deputy is often consulted by investigators from other agencies, Southerland said.

All deputies will see a pay increase under this new salary plan.

Brown County is not alone in trying to find ways to pay officers more to keep them here and attract the best candidates.

{span}The city of Bedford was working with with financial adviser Baker Tilly to examine city finances to keep employees and attract the best to their department to serve, according to the Times-Mail newspaper. In Bedford, a {span}third class police officer or firefighter starts at $46,412; the chiefs earn $57,168.

Council says

The county council voted 5-1 to accept the new pay scale with council President Dave Redding abstaining and council member Judy Swift-Powdrill voting against it. Redding has served as an unpaid reserve deputy with the department.

“Who are we going to cut? This has to have sustainability. We all know what puts companies out of business is employees, their benefit packages, etc. We need to think about this long term,” Powdrill said before casting her vote against the proposal.

Powdrill said that losing employees to larger counties that pay more is not uncommon. “Unfortunately, we are a small county, and trying to compete with larger counties is tough,” she said.

Powdrill previously worked in the county health department. That department also will likely lose employees in the next few years due to pay, she said. “They took from January up until about a month ago to find a nurse because they can go to a hospital and make $60,000 starting out,” she said of the health department.

“We need to look at the big picture, not just one department.”

Powdrill said the council should look at the sheriff’s department’s entire benefit package and their retirement plan, seeing if it is possible to take from retirement contributions to boost pay. Currently, employees contribute 3 percent of their salary toward a retirement and pension plan, Southerland said. State law sets a maximum of a 6 percent contribution for a county the size of Brown County.

“If a deputy leaves early, then he or she are returned the amount they have contributed, not the amount the county has contributed,” he explained. But he added that a deputy leaving can also hurt the retirement plan if not as much money is in there. Southerland has asked that the plan be funded at the accelerated amount allowed by the state in order to make it more stable in years to come.

“It has not been funded adequately over the years. I think there were many years where the minimum amount to keep it legal was paid,” Southerland said.

Council Vice President Dave Critser said approving the new pay scale was a “very, very wise investment.”

“When I drive by McDonald’s and see $13 per hour, a full-time person can make $28,000 a year working at McDonald’s. You don’t normally get robbed or shot at (working at McDonald’s), so I don’t see a problem with this at all. I think it’s a good deal,” council member Art Knight said.

Deputies would all be making the same amount despite the number of years with the department. The logic behind that is they are doing the same work, with promotion opportunities based on experience and time on the job, Southerland said.

The department also will continue to offer incentives for deputies who receive additional training. A deputy can earn a maximum of six certifications at $250 per certification each year.

Council members Scott Rudd and Darren Byrd asked about increasing the incentive pay for training at the same time they increase salaries. “If we want to keep highly trained people, if it’s really expensive to replace them then why don’t we look at that?” Rudd said. “If we do this and you come back next year for more, that’s going to be harder. I’d like to do this. If we’re going to do it, do it right.”

Southerland said he liked the concept of paying officers higher incentives for getting training, but increasing the pay will help the “real problem” of losing deputies three to five years after they join the department.

He thinks that boosting pay also will help attract officers with more experience to come to Brown County after leaving larger city departments due to the national climate and violence being promoted against officers by some groups.

“We want to be attractive to young officers, but we also want to be attractive to guys who are considering leaving their departments instead of always being a breeding ground,” Det. Brian Shrader said at the meeting.

Sustaining it

Toward the end of the meeting, Rudd questioned the council on how they would pay the additional $120,000 each year to sustain this salary model.

“We’re already going into a tough budget session. We already have cuts to make. We’re adding to it. This is not a one-time thing. It’s forever. If it was one time, it would be a lot easier for me to say, ‘Let’s make it work,’ but this is forever on top of increases in pay. It’s not a lightweight decision,” he said.

Critser asked to see the amount of unappropriated money the county was projected to have in its budget by the end of the year, thinking the increase in pay could be covered there. “I anticipate that being, truthfully, over $1 million,” he said of money he thought would be left over at the end of the year.

County commissioner Diana Biddle said she would have to account for all of the Social Security, Medicare and other benefits from the commissioners’ budget.

Byrd said the pay increase should be sustained by the lack of turnover and training. “That will pay for it five years down the road,” he said.

Biddle said that she had asked the county’s financial adviser, Baker Tilly, to look at taxes that relate to public safety, some of which aren’t being charged now or not at the level they could be. The council was to meet on Aug. 9 to hear a financial forecast, then county budget hearings will happen most of the week of Aug. 16.

“We are leaving money on the table. We are not taking advantage of LIT (local income tax) jail fund. We have the opportunity to fund a LIT PSAP (Public Safety Access Point) fund,” Biddle said.

If additional tax money was charged, the way the county is paying for certain personnel now could be moved around in the budget to make room for the deputy pay increase, other public safety personnel, or building work, like at the Law Enforcement Center.

Biddle said asked Baker Tilly to run numbers on how implementing a LIT PSAP fund would impact the tax rate.

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The Brown County Council will have budget reviews for various county departments beginning on Tuesday, Aug. 17 at 5 p.m. in the Salmon Room at the County Office Building, 201 Locust Lane.

On Aug. 17 the council is scheduled to hear budget requests from the following departments: Circuit court and probation; prosecutor; clerk and election board; public defender board; recorder; treasurer; and auditor.

On Wednesday, Aug. 18 the council will requests from the following departments beginning at 5 p.m.: Plan commission; parks and recreation; veterans affairs; emergency management; soil and water; and the health department.

Budget reviews conclude on Thursday, Aug. 19. The first review will be at 5 p.m. Budgets from the coroner, surveyor, sheriff’s department, the highway department and the commissioners will be reviewed that evening.

The county council does not formally adopt a budget until October. Cuts are anticipated as the county weighs departments’ budget requests against projections for tax income for 2022.

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