Floyd County Supervisors look for budget cuts in light of law enforcement center costs

By Bob Steenson, bsteenson@charlescitypress.com

The new Floyd County Law Enforcement Center loomed over the Board of Supervisors meeting Tuesday afternoon, both because of its financial and now its legal impact.

The supervisors continued working on the budget for the new fiscal year that will begin July 1, looking to whittle away spending or come up with extra revenue wherever possible to help make up for the spending required to help pay to complete the law enforcement center (LEC) project.

The board also went into closed session for about an hour with Assistant County Attorney Randy Tilton to discuss the legal situation regarding the project’s architectural firm, that the supervisors blame for at least part of the project’s financial problems.

After opening the meeting back up to the public, the three supervisors unanimously approved a motion to authorize Tilton to notify Prochaska & Associates, “that due to beach of contract, and default under the contract as outlined by Mr. Tilton, with Floyd County, we intend to stop payments once the original contract amount of $1,089,870 is reached.”

Prochaska & Associates, the project architect, originally estimated the construction cost for the new law enforcement center at about $11 million, plus additional costs for financing and other expenses that would bring the total close to $13.5 million.

That $13.5 million is the amount of general obligation bonds that county voters in May 2018 overwhelmingly approved allowing the county to issue to pay for the new law enforcement center and updates on the county courthouse.

But when bids on the project were opened in September 2019, the total construction cost came in at $14.4 million. With other fees and expenses, the total project cost grew to more than $16.4 million.

For the past almost a year and a half, the supervisors, along with Prochaska and construction manager The Samuels Group, have been working on ways to cut costs, including not doing as much as originally planned as far as office renovations in the courthouse.

The straw that broke the supervisors’ figurative back came last summer, when Prochaska informed the county that its bill on the project had increased from about $1.1 million to more than $1.6 million.

The reason for that, explained Prochaska architect and project manager Curtis Field, is that Prochaska’s contracted fee was based on 10% of the construction cost. When the cost of the project went up more than $5 million, their fee went up accordingly.

The county has been battling with Prochaska over that fee since last July, with both sides implying legal action may be taken.

Tilton wrote a letter to Field last August, saying, “The county believes that your firm has been deficient in performing its duties under … the agreement between owner and architect.”

Field answered that the original estimate of the project’s cost was reasonable based on the information available at that time, and suggested that other actions beyond its control were at least partly responsible for the bids coming in high.

He concluded a lengthy message by writing, “However, as we see this issue, the county’s unwillingness to look more deeply into a solution is, in our view, a simple breach of our contract.”

Also at the supervisors meeting Tuesday — the first afternoon meeting after deciding recently to hold their regular meetings at 1 p.m. instead of 9 a.m. on the second and fourth Tuesday’s of the month — the board began calling department heads in to again discuss their budgets.

Because of the costs of the law enforcement center and courthouse projects, the county is dipping into its general fund reserves next fiscal year by about $2.3 million, potentially increasing proposed property tax collections over the current fiscal year by a double-digit increase, and so the supervisors are looking at making cuts in some of the budgets that have been proposed by department heads and elected officials.

Supervisor Chair Linda Tjaden asked Sheriff Jeff Crooks if there was any way he could do without either or both of the two new vehicles proposed for the next fiscal year, or either or both of the two additional jailers.

“No. Neither one’s a possibility,” Crooks said.

He said the department is running squad vehicles for five to six years, putting 150,000 to 170,000 miles on them.

“You’re putting deputies’ lives at risk if you’re asking them to try to squeeze more out of those squad cars,” he said.

“The State Patrol goes three years, 90,000 miles. We go five to six years, 150- to 170,000 miles. When you’re responding to calls and when you’re pushing your car to 120 miles an hour, you can’t ask my deputies to do that. I can’t. I won’t,” he said.

Regarding the additional jailers, raising the department total from seven to nine, Crooks said the new law enforcement facility is three times as big as the current jail that’s located on the top floor of the courthouse.

“You look at the facility we run now, and it’s a close-proximity facility and we get by with one jailer (per shift). The great thing about it is our offices are really close, so during the day we usually have a deputy or myself that’s right there a lot of times,” Crooks said.

The new LEC will be much more spread out, and the detention area will be run by a control center that requires a jailer to be in it at all times to lock and unlock doors and control the movement within the facility.

Another jailer is needed to be the roamer, to cook meals, clean, book detainees in and out, handle bonds, and more, he said.

The supervisors also looked at possible cuts in pay increases proposed by several departments that are significantly above the 2.5% increase the supervisors told departments to figure in their budgets.

Some of the increases, in Conservation and the Sheriff’s Department, are to bring certain staff up to the level of their peers. Floyd County Public Health is proposing 5% pay increases for all staff, because of the additional work and the circumstances of dealing with the COVID-19 pandemic.

Supervisors will need to make budget decisions soon, as the fiscal year 2021-22 budget must be approved and sent to the state by the end of March.

Two public hearings need to be held on the budget before then, and there are requirements for how much notice county residents must be given before the hearings, so time is ticking away.

A special board meeting has been called for 1 p.m. today (Friday) because the courthouse offices will be closed Monday for Presidents Day.