Crook County reviews sheriff staffing scenarios as budget tool shows shortfall

Crook County commissioners on Oct. 17 reviewed a staff-built budgeting tool that models varying staffing levels and personnel costs for the sheriff’s office, and heard staff say the office responded to 685 incidents on state highways from Jan. 1 through Oct. 10, 2025, including 53 crashes.

Will Van Vactor, the county manager, framed the session as a follow-up to a Sept. 29 special meeting on core services and described tables showing statutory minimum, current, critical and ideal staffing and the associated FTE counts and personnel costs for patrol, jail, probation and administrative divisions. "This is truly just a tool," Van Vactor said in introducing the spreadsheet and its scenarios.

A sheriff’s office representative presented recent activity counts to illustrate workload. "Times that we've responded to things on the State Highway was 685 times from January 1 until October 10 ... And out of those 685 times that we've responded to something on the highway, 53 of those were crashes," the representative said, adding that many highway responses were self-initiated traffic stops.

Staff also told commissioners courthouse security had required an additional deputy 297 times in the same Jan. 1–Oct. 10 period and noted a recent high-profile trial that required five deputies over two days, which was handled separately and not included in the routine tally.

Crystal Hughes demonstrated the county’s interactive Excel tool that lets staff toggle each division between minimum/current/critical/ideal to see net budget effects. As an example, she showed an "ideal" scenario and that the current fiscal-year budget figure in the tool was $10,060,000; the tool produced a total FTE cost example of $10,323,000 under an all-current scenario, illustrating a shortfall under current staffing levels.

Commissioners pressed staff for more granular options between the preset labels so the county could model incremental trade-offs — for example, adding a partial FTE in one division while reducing overtime or delaying equipment purchases in another. Staff and the sheriff's office warned that while the board sets overall funding, the sheriff determines the office’s internal allocations once money is appropriated.

Speaking remotely, the sheriff (John) thanked the board and reiterated that the office will "use whatever budget that we get to the best of our ability to provide the services our citizens ask for," and emphasized deputies’ responsibility to respond to crashes and citizen calls even when incidents occur on state highways.

The county manager said the county wants to use the metrics to better advocate to the state for reimbursement or assistance for statutorily mandated services such as court security, noting the legislature had previously declined a funding proposal for that mandate.

The board did not take any formal staffing or budget votes at the session. Staff said they will continue core-services conversations with other departments and aim to return a consolidated package to the board in early 2026.

The meeting adjourned after a motion to adjourn was made and seconded and those present voted in favor.