Newly confirmed supervision director requests raises, IT modernization and GPS responder pay

A newly confirmed director (name not given in the transcript) introduced staff and told the committee the agency faces recruitment and retention pressures that threaten operations. The director requested $1,499,000 in recurring funds for retention salary increases for staff earning below $100,000 and asked that career-path step increases be funded for eligible law-enforcement personnel.

IT and operations: The director said the agency spends over $1,000,000 annually on contract positions for IT modernization and asked for five FTEs (estimated $629,200 including fringe) to internalize that work, plus a nonrecurring hardware/software refresh and a fleet replacement request of $857,544 for leased vehicles.

Specialized caseloads and victim services: The agency seeks additional staff for domestic-violence specialized caseloads and mental-health caseworkers and reported a drop in domestic-violence offender rearrest rates in the supervised population from 79 percent (2014) to 32 percent (2023) after a 2017 specialized-unit rollout.

GPS monitoring: The director asked for $292,410 to increase special-assignment pay for GPS responders who staff 24/7 alarm response for electronic monitoring; proposed pay tiers of $800 or $1,800 depending on county alarm volume were described as retention measures.

Next steps: The director offered to provide detailed cost information and noted these requests are intended to reduce long-term contract spend and improve service delivery. Committee members thanked the director and agreed to continue working with the agency; no appropriation vote occurred during the session.