Deputy pay raised 37 percent with law enforcement tax
By Kyle Troutman ktroutman@cassville-democrat.com
More than six months of collection of the half-cent law enforcement sales tax has given the Barry County Sheriff’s Office an immediate boost, and Sheriff Danny Boyd hopes full staffing will come with firmer budget numbers toward the end of this year.
The tax measure, intended to fully fund the sheriff’s office with its own sales tax, passed in April 2022 and began collection in October 2022, giving the county a few months of collection with which to project this year’s income.
Boyd said with more than six months of collection now, staffing on the road deputy side is doing better, but jail staffing is still lacking.
Two deputy positions remain open, one road deputy and one detective, and starting pay at the department has been a significant investment with the sales tax thus far.
Starting pay was at around $35,000, raised about 37 percent at the start of the year to just over $43,000 when accounting a $1,200 state supplement automatically included.
That hefty hike, Boyd said, has helped the Office attract more deputy prospects, and better ones.
“We have a new hire from Republic who is not from here but is willing to move here because the pay is up,” Boyd said. “This is big for the quality of hires too, like this officer has 10 years experience in Republic. It will also help us retain deputies a lot better.”
New deputies undergo a field training program to acclimate to Barry County’s crime tendencies and reporting practices. After a time of riding along with a deputy, a new hire even after getting their own vehicle will have a more experienced deputy shadow calls for a time to ensure training is complete.
“Most deputies with prior experience know how to handle a call, but when it comes to paperwork, they have to learn how our county does things.”
Boyd said the office and Barry County Commission used a quarter of the budget increase from the sales tax and put it toward salaries, and the office is still adjusting.
“We have 12 road deputies, myself, the deputy sheriff, two detectives and two bailiffs,” he said. “Our response times are improving, but with only two deputies on, we have to send both to domestics because situations can get out of hand. And Shell Knob to Yonkerville is 45 minutes. Another one or two on each shift would really help. Right now, every shift change, we are already three of four calls down.”
Boyd’s goal of having three vehicles on the road per shift — allowing for a north car, south car and floating car to meet the county’s needs as effectively as possible — is one he hopes to check off in next year’s budget.
“People come in and say if they were doing it they’d change this or that, or add more people, and they don’t understand you have to work on a budget. If you don’t work with the commissioners and on a budget, there can be problems. One commissioner came on the road with me a couple weeks ago and agreed we need more help. But funding within our budget, we are still kept from having three per shift.”
Boyd said it costs about $100,000 per deputy to get a new hire on the road, which includes the vehicle, uniform, training, salary, retirement, insurance and more.
Ongoing training and area Boyd said has improved, employing a new strategy to save funds and complete trainings.
“We were lacking in training because we didn’t have the money for it,” he said. “Now, instead of sending three or four off, we send one, and they come back and train the rest of the department. We’ve trained more on things like intoxilyzers, tasers and more.”
On the jail side, pay has risen from $29,000 per year to $33,000, but staffing is a challenge.
“Jail conditions do not help,” Boyd said. “It’s not functioning as well as it should, but the new jail will, and it will need three to four staff at all times to run properly.”
Boyd believes the new facility will be an attractant to possible employees.
“When we got the budget passed, we tried to raise salaries more, but we were afraid to over-budget. It’s easier to go up than come down. I think a state-of-the-art facility inside and set up like a proper jail will help greatly with hiring.”
In recent months, Boyd said the Barry County Sheriff’s Office has continued to deal mostly with domestic incidents and property crimes, all of which is commonly fueled by substance use.
“We have a ton of domestics and property crime because the way the economy is, people are not working but trying to keep up with habits, and the only way to do that is to steal,” Boyd said. “Domestics are the same. People are not working, and when this happens they are usually intoxicated, or there is some other factor that has escalated the situation.”
The county has also been tracking overdoses — a total of six since January — all of which have been on Fentanyl.
“It’s usually mixed with meth,” Boyd said. “Everyone is asking if we have a fix for it, and we don’t know how to stop it. Now that marijuana is legal, people selling that have moved on to selling other habits, and we can’t keep a grip on it. As soon as we catch one group over here, another pops up over there.”
Another budget adjustment planned for 2024, Boyd said, is an additional detective specializing in narcotics.
“Next year, the goal is to hire a fulltime narcotics detective, because we could keep one very busy,” Boyd said.
To hopefully decrease the number of overdose deaths, all deputies carry the nasal spray version of Narcan, which has shown effective in reversing opiate-based overdoses from drugs like fentanyl and heroin.
“Usually, when we get to the scene, EMS has already administered it if they needed,” Boyd said. “We did have one call in for a vehicle stopped at a stop sign for a long time, and that person had overdosed and our deputy used Narcan to stop it. We had another a while back on a traffic stop where the vehicle was rushing the individual to the hospital and our deputy pulled them over and administered the Narcan on the traffic stop.”
Boyd said in talking with other sheriffs in the state, fentanyl is becoming an issue even in schools.
“They see a lot more in schools, so we have been trying to talk to our schools to get Narcan in each classroom, except for Cassville because it has a resource officer,” Boyd said. “That’s the thing about this is the usage age ranges so widely, and it’s easy to get Fentanyl in different forms.”
To help stem all crime in the county, Boyd said residents should continue to be vigilant and call in suspicious activity.
“Especially with commercial stuff, like if you see a car parked for a while at a gas station that is closed, call us,” Boyd said. “Even if it’s nothing, we can check. A place in Yonkerville was broken into not long ago, and people saw the truck out there but did not call. We’ve also had a lot of ATM thefts by people coming out of Texas and targeting rural ATMs with less traffic.”
Vigilance includes residents’ own dwellings, Boyd said, as vehicle thefts are on the rise.
“We’ve had a rash of stolen vehicles, and when people ask what they can do, I say locking the car would help,” Boyd said.
Homeowners who are not in their properties year-round should remain extra vigilant, as Boyd said squatters can be difficult to control.
“We can’t get squatters out of a house without the homeowner’s help,” Boyd said. “We have them one or two times per week coming up from Arkansas, walking the highway. It’s hard to keep up with everything going on.
Looking ahead, Boyd said this summer will be a telling time financially for the office, as sales tax revenues will begin to shape what improvements can be made in 2024, with the main focuses being more deputies on the road and a focus on removing narcotics.
