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Prosecution commission seeks recurring funds for solicitor technology and retention
Summary
The Prosecution Commission asked for workforce retention funding and for recurring appropriations to cover solicitors' digital‑evidence maintenance and storage; solicitors proposed a roughly $5.08 million per‑year target to support case‑management maintenance and evidence storage across jurisdictions.
Lisa Catalonado, executive director of the South Carolina Commission on Prosecution Coordination, told the committee the commission has increased prosecutor staffing and non‑attorney positions and is seeking $70,000 in recurring funds for workforce retention plus about $53,006 in recurring funds to lease additional office space for training and staff capacity.
Fourteenth Circuit Solicitor Duffy Stone, chairman of the commission, told members the growth in digital evidence — body cameras, social media, cell‑phone records and other files — has created recurring storage and maintenance costs for the case‑management systems that solicitors now use. Stone said the commission originally requested $6 million but refined the ask to a more specific total of $5,080,000 to better match jurisdictional needs and to fund maintenance and storage so evidence can be organized and delivered to defense counsel and courts.
Stone asked the committee to consider amending proviso 60.3 (the appropriation vehicle used previously for judicial circuit support) and noted an existing proviso (117.157) that requires annual reporting on warrants and retention use. Committee members asked about current rent and staffing counts; Catalonado said her office has 10 staff and is fully staffed at present.
The committee recorded the presentations for further budget deliberations; no final appropriation was decided on the floor that day.
