Sue Sterling
The Daily Star-Journal
WARRENSBURG — Sheriff Chuck Heiss told Johnson County commissioners Thursday he is “trying to find the most economical and efficient way to do business so we can maximize our revenues.”
Heiss met with commissioners in the first budget review session for the 2014 budget year, which began Jan. 1.
Commissioners plan to meet monthly with Heiss to review revenues and expenditures, and to discuss budget issues. Meetings are planned to keep the sheriff’s and jail expenditures within budget this year and avoid large transfers from the General Revenue Fund to cover annual shortages in the two budgets.
Presiding Commissioner Bill Gabel said the Sheriff’s Office budget is $3,300 under budget to date. The jail budget is $23,000 over budget.
Heiss said the Sheriff’s Office has some vacancies, which resulted in savings for the month. He said he would check into the overage in the jail budget.
“That’s why we’re doing a monthly review” to discover issues “and not wait until the end of the year,” Gabel said.
Commissioners said some of the overage is due to paying insurance premiums to start the year.
Heiss said his office billed other agencies $1,246,671 last year for inmate housing, with about $1.1 million collected.
He said the remainder will come in through mid-February, due to differences in billing cycles, but will go into the 2014 revenue totals.
Sheriff’s fees collected last year totaled $98,668, coming in close to the budgeted estimate of $100,000 and bringing total revenue to $1.345 million, he said.
Heiss said he is “uneasy” with the $1.7 million in revenue budgeted for jail inmate fees for 2014. He projected inmate housing revenue at $1.5 million for the year, but commissioners budgeted the higher amount based on Auditor Chad Davis‘ estimate.
“That’s way too aggressive,” Heiss said. “I don’t want you to be disappointed if it comes in at $1.5 million.”
With $100,000 in estimated sheriff’s fees in 2014, jail revenue will come in around $1.6 million, based on his projection, Heiss said. The amount should fund jail expenditures, budgeted at $1.2 million, without tapping into the law enforcement sales tax revenues, he said.
Commissioners gave all sales tax, inmate housing and fee revenues to the Sheriff’s Office and jail, which have been separated from the Law Enforcement Fund to provide better budget tracking.
This will be the first full year for collecting inmate housing revenue, Heiss said, which will provide a more accurate picture of revenues and expenditures.
“Expenses go up with revenue. I don’t want us to be lulled to sleep by higher income,” Gabel said, which he said translates into higher costs.
Heiss said, “The challenge is we have to increase revenue and hold the line on expenditures.”
INMATE BILLS
Heiss said a change in state statutes allows the county to collect jail housing costs from Johnson County inmates.
“I’m working with the courts to present (bills) when inmates go to final adjudication,” he said.
If a defendant is placed on probation and remains under the court’s jurisdiction, the county will have leverage to collect payment, which can be made a condition of probation, he said.
If the defendant fails to pay, the account can be turned over to a collection agency, which will take part of the collection.
The county can notify the state if a defendant is delinquent on jail bills, he said. The state can withhold the amount from tax returns, lottery winnings and other income due the defendant, he said.
But if a defendant is indigent “chances of collecting are nil,” Heiss said.
He said clarification is needed on court authority.
When the plan is implemented, the county will have an additional revenue stream from the jail, Heiss said.
Heiss said Johnson County, like other counties, bills other jurisdictions when they pick up prisoners on warrants, but three counties refused to pay the bills because “no funds have been allocated.”
He said he plans to send letters to the three counties that he expects payment in full or he will turn over the account to a collection agency.
Heiss said Johnson County budgets to pay inmate bills. If other counties do not, they are at fault.
SHERIFF’S FLEET
The office has spent $125,000 in mechanical repairs in the last 24 months, Heiss said.
“I believe that’s throwing good money after bad,” he said.
Heiss said he would like to develop a program in which vehicles are kept under warranty.
Eastern Commissioner Scott Sader said vehicles come with five-year, 100,000-mile warranties.
Heiss said sheriff’s vehicles traveled more than 800,000 miles last year, including four purchased in mid-2012 that each have exceeded 100,000 miles.
“That’s not many miles for an average vehicle,” he said, “but for an emergency vehicle fleet it’s an enormous amount.”
Fleet vehicles run “24/7,” he said, and travel much of the time on the 1,100 miles of gravel roads in the county, which is “hard on cars.”
He said some fleet vehicles have been driven more than 200,000 miles.
“When we get to the point we’re replacing motors and rear ends, that’s not efficient,” he said. “I’d like to replace three or four (vehicles) per year and not get in a situation where we’re replacing 12 in one fell swoop.”
In a written report to commissioners, Heiss said an annual replacement program would cut maintenance costs and increase trade-in allowances, reducing the overall cost of new vehicles.
“The key is to develop a program gradually and not have to buy an enormous amount of cars every year,” he said.
Gabel said the county paid off the last four cars in 2013 and “if everything holds together budgetwise, we maybe can buy four this year. It all comes down to money.”
He said he wants to have a budget surplus this year.
“I think we can save ourselves a lot of money in the way we’re doing business. … I think we can work together to come up with a program that’s more efficient and cost-effective than the way we’ve done it for the last 18 years,” Heiss said.
AUXILIARY FUEL TANK
Heiss said placing a fuel tank at the jail also would save mileage, maintenance and fuel costs because deputies would not have to drive into Warrensburg to fill up at the county’s bulk fuel facility on East North Street. He estimated that placing a tank at the jail, discussed when the county acquired the facility, would save $80,000 annually in fuel costs and save wear and tear on vehicles.
COUNTY COURT
Establishing a county court to handle misdemeanors and infractions on a county level would allow the county to keep, rather than send to the state, fine money and court costs, Heiss said.
“We’re sending thousands every year to the state,” he said.
Heiss said Circuit Judge Bill Collins said the system works in Cass County and has resulted in several hundred thousand dollars in income per year. Heiss said Cass County Sheriff Dwight Diehl will provide him a sample of codified ordinances.
“(The court) is a very real possibility,” Heiss said, “but it will take some work.”
JAIL STAFFING
Jail understaffing affects employee morale, Heiss said, and “is not safe.”
He said he requested eight additional jailers last year, “but we weren’t in a position financially to make it happen. … It’s a huge issue that needs to be addressed.”
Gabel said the jail budget allocates $900,000 for salaries, which he said seems sufficient for staffing.
Heiss said he will “go back and look at the numbers.”
He said he is reviewing ways to augment staff without affecting the budget, such as using part-time help and possibly criminal justice interns from the University of Central Missouri.
“I’m asking staff to develop a program so I can take it to the head of the Criminal Justice Department,” he said.
In his letter to commissioners, Heiss said, “If jail staffing is not increased to levels sufficient to ensure the personal safety of the men and women working in the facility, I will be forced to reconsider our continued partnerships with the numerous agencies that currently utilize our facility.”
He cited “staggering statistics” for jail activity over the past 13 months, including in 2013:
65,302 total inmate days; 7,441 new incarcerations; 178.91 average inmate count, ranging from a low of 92 to a high of 242.
Statistics for 2014 include: 6,752 total inmate days; 639 new incarcerations; 217.81 average inmate count, ranging from a low of 187 to a high of 258.