Idaho Finance Department requests six new examiners; governor declines two consumer-investigator positions

The Department of Finance asked the Joint Finance Appropriations Committee on Jan. 21 for six new full-time positions and $816,600 drawn from the agency’s state regulatory funds to expand examination and cybersecurity capacity.

Noah Peterson, a budget and policy analyst with the Legislative Services Office, reviewed the agency’s request and noted the Department of Finance is organized as one program with three bureaus — the Financial Institutions Bureau, the Consumer Finance Bureau and the Securities Bureau — and has 72 full-time personnel. Peterson said the materials and line-item numbers are in the legislative budget book (LBB pages 5-025B and 5-0025C).

The agency proposed six enhancements funded from regulatory fees: an IT examiner and a second financial examiner for the Financial Institutions Bureau (each budgeted at $121,300, listed at 100% of policy, salary grade P); two Financial Investigator 3 positions to focus on IT examinations for mortgage/credit services and consumer services (budgeted at $82,500, salary grade M); a cybersecurity-specialist Financial Investigator 3 for the Securities Bureau ($82,500); and a forensic-accounting–specialty financial examiner for the Securities Bureau ($82,500). The request also included a one-time capital-outlay package recommended by the Office of Information Technology Services: $42,000 for laptops, $6,100 for docking stations and $4,500 for portable field monitors.

Peterson told the committee the Department of Finance routinely spends above 90% of its appropriation and that personnel costs accounted for roughly 77.8% of recent expenditures; operating costs were about 21% and capital outlay 1.2%.

Director Patty Perkins, director of the Department of Finance, described growing cybercrime and elder‑targeted fraud as a driver of the request. "There is a huge increase in cybercrime," Perkins told the committee, adding the department has partnered with the Idaho State Police and other law-enforcement partners to follow the money and access specialized tools for cryptocurrency and other investigations.

Senator Melissa Wintrow and Senator Cook asked for supporting workload or outcome data to justify the added FTEs and to enable later measurement of results. Perkins agreed to provide a report to the committee on caseload, recent investigations and other supporting information.

The governor recommended all of the Department of Finance’s requests except the two Financial Investigator 3 positions requested for the Consumer Finance Bureau (the two IT-focused investigator positions). Perkins said the agency supports the governor’s recommendation.

No formal appropriation votes were taken during the presentation; committee members asked for additional data before final decisions.