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Suncoast Pasco News
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The Frugal Sheriff
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Published: February 21, 2009
For years there was an annual late-summer rite that occurred all around Florida. The local sheriff, in good economic times or bad, would suggest in a public fashion the bad guys were winning the upper hand and the sheriff's agency needed more money to put extra personnel and equipment on the street to take back the initiative. In Pasco County over the decades there have been spirited battles between the sheriff of the moment and the County Commission, which under state law can make cuts in Sheriff's Office spending.
So many longtime county government observers must have been a bit amazed when Pasco Sheriff Bob White recently announced that during the 2010 fiscal year, which begins Oct. 1, he will only accept roughly a quarter of the Sheriff's Office cut of Penny for Pasco revenue, about $600,000. White said other parts of county government could use the other $1.8 million. Although there were questions raised as to whether White can do this under the ordinance that created the Penny for Pasco special sales tax levy, the sheriff seems to have caught the spirit of our cash-strapped times.
Meanwhile, in Pinellas County, where the economic times are equally tough, Sheriff Jim Coats has announced in recent weeks he will forgo spending millions over the next few years by reorganizing his agency and closing units of the Pinellas County jail.
It appears the Age of the Frugal Sheriff is upon us. We wonder how far it will spread.
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