Sheriff requests staff increases and special-revenue funding as process-service workload jumps

The sheriff's office presented an FY25-26 special-revenue estimate on April 16 that requests an increase of about $99,003.73, primarily to fund staffing and specialized positions, including two additional process-service employees.

Sheriff's office leadership told the committee that process-service workload has grown sharply, from 11,228 papers served in 2021 to 16,873 in 2024, an increase of roughly 53 percent. The office said the current functional workload for process servers is handled by about 10 staff but that the growth in documents and court-ordered service now warrants additional dedicated positions to avoid continuing backlog and delays in judicial processing.

Other items in the sheriff's request included modest increases tied to specialty positions, fuel and benefits adjustments (the office noted higher benefit costs), and a request to place a general-counsel position into the general-fund payroll rather than special revenue as the county considers organizational alignment. The sheriff emphasized the two process-service positions as the top priority and said those roles would materially relieve a growing operational bottleneck.

The Budget Evaluation Team moved and seconded a motion to receive the sheriff's estimated needs for FY25-26; the motion carried by voice vote. No appropriation was approved at the meeting; committee members indicated they would review the data and consider how to address workload-driven staffing pressures during the budget deliberation process.

Next steps: the sheriff was asked to provide supporting documentation about the process-service workload metrics and to confirm whether any costs could be covered through special-revenue balances before recommending changes to the general-fund base.