GROVETON — The Trinity County Commissioners Court approved the next budget and tax rate, but not before being upbraided by the Sheriff’s Office and a county resident.
The budget shows General Fund revenues and expenditures of $9,278,097, and Road and Bridge revenues and expenditures of $12,211,499.
The court also approved a tax rate of 0.539 per $100 of property valuation, the same as was levied in the previous fiscal year. However, with the change in property valuations, the county will see an additional $273,979 in revenue.
Commissioner Tommy Park said that the four-month process of budgeting was not the best four months of his life, and next year he would like to see a change to the process to shorten it.
Chief Deputy Jeremy Carroll, referring to discussions at a previous special session called for budget discussions, expressed his disappointment with Commissioner Neal Smith and his disparaging comments about the management and leadership of the SO.
Carroll also pointed out that while all departments were required to at least attempt to cut their budgets by 5 percent, the SO cut theirs by almost 7 percent. He also said that while the commissioners enjoy an $18,000 per annum vehicle allowance, other officials only get $12,000, and that the commissioners weren’t driving what amounts mathematically to almost 110 miles per day.
He also mentioned that those figures seemed to confuse members of the court.
Carroll told Smith that his obvious displeasure with law enforcement, and seemingly public safety in general — which he was entitled to — as well as his blatant disrespect for them will not be taken lightly.
“Commissioner Smith, I'm growing increasingly tired of your disrespect and your personal bias towards public safety in this county guiding your decisions and impacting the livelihoods of my employees and your constituents,” Carroll said. “Your lack of knowledge or desire to gain any related to the operation of the Sheriff's Office is a result of one of two things — your ego or your ignorance, and I don't think it's the latter because you are smart man. Your actions, Commissioner Smith, are not falling on deaf ears or blind eyes.
“We're watching you and you will be held accountable,” he said. “Even if that means I spend two days a month coming to address this court before the residents of this county. Commissioner Smith, I'll leave you with this. I pray to God that if you ever call 911, I'm working and my staff are working because you know what? We're going to show up and we're going to do our job to the best of our ability like it would for any other resident.”
Smith called the comments a staged deal to try to make him look bad.
“I'm going to always look after the county's money, and when I see something that I don't think is right, I'm going to bring it forth,” he said.
At a special meeting on Sept. 22, the county took 15 minutes to decide that staffing at the jail was to remain at six full-time employees, one supervisor and five part-time employees.
Sheriff Woody Wallace said that those levels will come at a cost because if the jail or dispatch goes into overtime, it would mean shutting the 911 operator down.
“We'll move our prisoners to another county and we're going to send (workers) home,” he said. “We will not do overtime. So, we're going to see just how short we really are this year.
“I don't think the public's going to be happy,” he said.
County Judge Danny Martin told Wallace the court was wanting him to watch the hours closer.
In other business, commissioners:
