Sheriff Forstall defends 2026 budget; heated public comment urges end to ICE detentions at county jail

Sheriff Carrie Forstall and Marion County Sheriff’s Office (MCSO) Chief Financial Officer Callen Carr presented the agency’s 2026 proposed budget to the City-County Public Safety and Criminal Justice Committee on Sept. 3, 2025. The presentation prompted extended council questioning and sustained public comment focused on ICE detainees held at the Marion County Adult Detention Center (ADC), jail conditions, inmate deaths and staffing.

CFO Callen Carr told the committee the sheriff’s office is proposing increases to staffing in the 2026 introduced budget and described three budget columns for comparison: the 2025 adopted budget, a projected 2025 revised budget, and the 2026 introduced budget. Carr said the agency’s budget development prioritized staffing: the 2026 proposal includes an increase of 55 detention-deputy full‑time equivalents and a total headcount in the introduced budget of 881 FTEs (535 assigned to the ADC, of whom 307 are detention deputies). Carr said the increased staffing is intended to reduce overtime reliance and help meet recommendations from a KPMG staffing study.

Sheriff Forstall described programs and services at the ADC and defended the agency’s practice of housing federal detainees. “We house the federal prisoners, and that's all that we do,” Forstall said, adding that the facility keeps ICE detainees in separate housing units and that the federal government pays for medical care for those detainees. Carr and the sheriff also…