‘Gobbling up more of the pie’: Richland County commissioners scrutinize sheriff’s 2027 budget plan

RICHLAND COUNTY — Richland County Commissioner Darrell Banks had a question for Sheriff Steve Sheldon on Thursday about the department’s 2027 budget request.

Where would the sheriff trim it?

The question came near the end of an hour-long meeting with Sheldon to discuss the department budget for 2027. Sheldon requested a 13-percent increase for next year compared to what commissioners appropriated for 2026.

The meeting Thursday was part of a continuing series of budget meetings commissioners are having with elected officials and department heads as they work toward finalizing a 2027 spending plan.

Banks said the RCSO receives about 44 percent of the county’s total general fund budget. The county had general fund appropriations of around $49 million in 2026.

Commissioners are the budgetary authority in a county, responsible for allocating general funds to most county departments and elected officials.

Banks said the commissioners will have to cut at least $6 million from overall 2027 budget requests.

“That means 40 to 44 percent (of those cuts) has got to come out of your budget — that’s $2.5 million plus,” Banks told the sheriff.

“You’re obviously the biggest. So you’re going to have to have probably a higher percentage, or a higher dollar amount, taken from your budget than other people. Please tell us where you think we should cut your budget,” the commissioner said.

Sheldon, joined at the meeting by Maj. Jim Sweat and Capt. James Myers, said he and his staff would review their projections and discuss potential adjustments with the board at a future meeting.

Banks said, “You don’t have to answer that today. But I think we’re going to be going over a lot of other (requests) and sit down and do all of it together (to fashion the final 2027 general fund spending plan). In the meantime, if you can figure out where you think we should cut it, let us know.”

Commissioners ask sheriff to identify recent cost-cutting measures

The sheriff’s budget request asks for increases in each of the department’s three key areas. It calls for $9.5 million in law enforcement (up from $8 million appropriated in 2026), $12.3 million for the jail ($10.8 million this year) and $2.4 million for the 911 center ($2.1 million in 2026).

Commissioner Tony Vero directly question Sheldon, zeroing in on the sheriff’s growing footprint within the county’s primary operating fund.

“The sheriff’s office is gobbling up more of the pie for the rest of the general fund,” Vero said, pressing Sheldon to identify concrete measures his administration had introduced to rein in costs in recent years.

“If I were to say, ‘Sheriff Sheldon, what are the three biggest budget initiatives you’ve put in place in the past three years to reduce costs?’ What would you say they are?” Vero asked.

Sheldon pointed to aggressive pursuit of grant funding, intergovernmental contracts, donations and restructuring outsourced vendor agreements, such as jail inmate food and medical care.

He said department brings in outside revenue to subsidize personnel, including contracts for four school resource officers, two child support enforcement deputies and a litter control deputy.

“There’s a lot of things that we do to reduce costs,” Sheldon said. “We’re law enforcement … we’re cops. We’ve got to respond to emergencies, which we do, and we assist other agencies.”

Vero, however, pushed back on whether those efforts amounted to operational spending cuts, pointing out that school contracts and food costs have continued to rise and that overall department staffing has not declined.

He expressed frustration that the narrative letter accompanying Sheldon’s budget request justified increases, but offered no proposals for cost reductions.

“I see all these reasons for justifying the request,” Vero said. “I don’t see one sentence dedicated from the sheriff … to say, ‘These are the measures we put in place to reduce costs.’ Not one sentence to it.”

Sheldon said he would detail cost-saving measures in next year’s letter, adding his department has adapted to past cuts, while absorbing community-wide law enforcement demands.

The board also scrutinized specific line items, including a $440,000 request for six new patrol cruisers; clothing allowances provided to non-uniformed civilian office personnel; and a department vehicle assigned to an unsworn employee living outside Richland County.

Sweat and Sheldon defended the take-home car, noting the employee oversees critical 911 communications infrastructure and is subject to around-the-clock emergency call-outs.

Jail operations drew considerable attention, particularly concerning liability and medical care. Vero noted that insurance deductibles surged to $100,000 after several inmate deaths between 2019 and 2024, comparing Richland County’s record unfavorably to four peer counties of similar population.

Sheldon and Myers, the jail administrator, defended the facility’s recent trajectory, crediting the implementation of a comprehensive medication-assisted treatment program funded through $750,000 in state grants over two years to assist inmates with drug problems.

Sheldon said the jail has logged zero inmate deaths over the past 19 months.

Sweat said the county jail effectively serves as the largest mental health facility in the county, reporting a single mental health professional inside the jail saw more than 250 individuals in the previous month alone.

A year ago, the RCSO proposed a budget of $22.3 million for 2026, which commissioners trimmed by almost seven percent.

Asked by the media if the sheriff’s office had considered budgeting based on historic staffing trends rather than full staffing — so commissioners wouldn’t have to cut as much from the back end — Sweat rejected that approach.

“I think it’s our responsibility as a sheriff’s office to give the commissioners the ultimate total liability for the projects and the operations that the sheriff wants us to execute, and that’s what we do yearly,” he said.