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Board accepts sheriff oversight report and keeps quarterly schedule pending online portal
Summary
The Contra Costa Board of Supervisors received the sheriff's quarterly oversight report on jail population, bookings, use-of-force and other metrics, voted to accept the report and to continue quarterly briefings for now while a public transparency portal is developed.
The Contra Costa County Board of Supervisors on May 13 accepted the sheriff's quarterly oversight report and voted to continue quarterly public briefings for the sheriff's office while county staff build an online transparency portal.
The report, delivered by Sheriff Livingston and staff, covered custody and field operations data for the first quarter of 2025, including booking trends, average daily jail populations, Narcan deployments, ICE notification requests, calls for service in unincorporated areas, and a rise in reports of staff being spat upon or hit with body fluids. Sheriff Livingston told the board several slides in the packet provide additional detail online and that a dedicated transparency portal, backed by newly budgeted data staff, should be available later this year to allow public searching of bookings, arrests, race and gender breakdowns and other metrics.
Board members pressed the sheriff on several issues. The sheriff said the county had 12 in-custody Narcan deployments in the first quarter and zero in-custody deaths so far in 2025, and that custody alternative bookings (a supervised-release program) showed a slight uptick in referrals and bookings for the same period. He told the board that of 41 ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) requests for notification during the quarter, only 27 notifications met the SB 54 state-law criteria and were actually made.
Supervisor Diane Burgis and others asked about trends by city and whether the report captures arrest practices that never result in county jail bookings. Sheriff Livingston said the county's figures reflect bookings into county facilities and will differ from each city's arrest data because of remands, court orders and other intake sources. Supervisors also discussed the custody-alternative program after the sheriff provided staff'compiled numbers showing 821 referrals to the custody alternative facility (CAF) from February to April 2025, with 757 accepted and approved (about a 92% approval rate); denials were attributed to failures to report, unsuitable housing, outstanding warrants or other disqualifying circumstances.
Supervisor Ken Carlson and others asked the sheriff to consider moving the briefing cadence to every six months; Sheriff Livingston proposed that option but told the board the data does not move dramatically quarter to quarter and that producing the packet requires substantial staff time. After discussion, the board voted to accept the report and to continue with quarterly oversight briefings for now, with the understanding the schedule could be revisited after the county's online data portal is operating.
The sheriff also reported operational items that will appear on the online portal, including a post-pandemic rise in concealed-carry permit applications (from roughly 400 before the Supreme Court carry decision to more than 1,600 currently), ongoing implicit-bias training, and grant applications, and noted the county is tracking whether ICE actually appears to meet detainees after notification is provided. The sheriff asked to reconsider the briefing cadence once the new portal and dedicated data staff are in place and pledged to return to the board earlier if major incidents occur.
The board vote to accept the sheriff's report and continue quarterly briefings passed 4-0 (Supervisor John Joya was absent).
