Sheriff outlines LERC operations, sabbatical program and staffing shortfalls as budget priorities

Sheriff Will Aiken told the Clay County Commission Wednesday that the Clay County Law Enforcement Resource Center (LERC) opened Oct. 31 and is intended to be a regional training asset that can cover operating costs with user fees rather than rely on ongoing general-fund support. ‘‘What you're seeing here is a breakdown of our organizational structure,’’ Aiken said at the start of his department presentation.

Aiken said the county’s law enforcement funds include several internal accounts and that personnel is the largest single expense. He described Guard 1 implementation and a key-track check system that he said is about ‘‘80% complete’’ and will help staff track critical infrastructure checks and cell inspections.

Aiken also spotlighted employee health and retention efforts. He described a county sabbatical program that requires officers to meet with a contracted clinician, Rachel Willoughby Green, before and after leave and to surrender law-enforcement credentials while on sabbatical: ‘‘We take everything from them except their badge and their gun and their credentials. We take their radio away from them. We take their take home car from them. We shut their email down.’’ The sheriff said the program has generated survey data and anecdotal feedback the office hopes to convert into a white paper to share with other agencies.

On staffing, Aiken said the sheriff’s office has not had an intentional, sustained increase in personnel since the 1990s and cited a historical assessment that the jail is about 37 positions short. ‘‘When I took over as sheriff 5 years ago, we actually had to restructure and move people around…we're still roughly 37 people short as according to the report that was created 26 years ago,’’ he said. Commissioners raised concerns about how the county would staff a new courtroom and a possible future jail and asked whether overtime and backfill for sabbaticals have been budgeted. Aiken said the county is still collecting data on operational impact and has not yet built a sabbatical backfill assumption into the budget.

Commissioners pressed whether projected revenue increases in the budget reflected new LERC income; county staff and the sheriff said they were not included in the current conservative projections because training schedules, pricing and partner demand are still being finalized. Aiken described efforts to set fees at levels that smaller agencies can afford and said the office will adjust pricing if partners indicate fees are too high.

Aiken also listed recent technology and accreditation milestones: body-worn cameras in the jail are fully implemented and the office expects a communications accreditation review in March. He framed the LERC as a potential revenue source for training and as an operational asset to meet continuing-education requirements.

The commission did not take a final policy vote on staffing or LERC pricing at the meeting; commissioners asked staff to continue collecting operational and revenue data and to return with clearer estimates during upcoming budget sessions.