Budget amendment approved in accord with decision
A recent opinion of the Office of the Sarasota County Attorney called for a construction project planned for years for the Sheriff’s Office to be under the purview of a County Commission-controlled department, instead of the law enforcement agency, a July 9 county staff memo explained.
As a result, with a unanimous vote on July 9, the Sarasota County commissioners approved a $622,000 amendment to the budget for the county’s Capital Improvement Program this fiscal year for facilities, as well as upgrades and renovations, for the Sheriff’s Office.
Of that amount, $574,000 would be dedicated to the upgrades and renovations program, the staff memo said.
The item was included on the board’s July 9 agenda as a Presentation Upon Request, meaning that unless a commissioner wanted to hear details of the proposal or had questions, no presentation would be provided.
With no one having signed up to provide public comments, and no commissioner seeking a presentation, Chair Joe Neunder closed the hearing and called for a motion. Commissioner Ron Cutsinger moved for approval, and Commissioner Teresa Mast seconded the motion.
A June 12 letter from Sheriff Kurt A. Hoffman to County Administrator Jonathan Lewis explained, “The Sheriff’s Office respectfully requests the transfer … from the Sheriff’s Office FY2O24|2O25 appropriations to the appropriate county accounts in the amount of $622,000. Recent County Attorney opinion has determined that construction type projects shall fall under the purview of the Board of County Commission and not the Sheriff’s Office.”
Hoffman added, “My office has coordinated with your [Capital Projects and General Services Department] teams to define the scope and estimated costs to ensure the identified projects can be completed.”
The related July 9 county staff memo characterized the situation thus: “Included within the appropriation for [the] Sarasota County Sheriff’s Office is funding for the execution of upgrades and renovations to County owned property occupied and utilized by the Sheriff’s Office. Recent findings have determined that projects of this nature should be executed under the Board of County Commissioners (BCC) authority as opposed to by the Sheriff’s Office.”
The memo continued, “Working together, staff from the Sheriff’s Office, Capital Projects and General Services have defined scope and estimated the costs of several projects and have agreed to the amount of funding necessary to execute these projects.”
The county list of projects to receive funding out of the revenue from the extra penny of sales tax that voters approved in November 2022 for another 15 years — from 2024 through 2039 — included $25 million for the expansion of the Sheriff’s Office’s headquarters on Cattleridge Boulevard in Sarasota. That money is scheduled to be used in the 2026 fiscal year, the chart noted.
A document provided to the County Commission during its May 21 budget workshop showed that the total amount of money budgeted for the Sheriff’s Office’s facilities upgrades and renovations is $84,790,264. Altogether, that document said, Law Enforcement Impact Fees, Justice Facility Impact Fees, the sales tax revenue (Surtax 4) allocation and borrowed funds — to be paid back from the county’s General Fund, which is made up largely of property tax revenue — would cover the expense of the work, which will be handled through the county’s General Services Department.
General Servicers handles county facilities, fleet services, materials management and the mailing and printing operations, as noted in a slide presented to the commissioners during their budget workshops early this month.
During the March 24, 2021 budget workshop with the commissioners seated at that time, Sheriff Hoffman pointed out that a 2016 analysis undertaken by Schenkel Shultz Architecture of Sarasota showed the Sheriff’s Office required 193,981 square feet for all its operations. The Cattleridge structure, he added, is “just shy of 72,000 square feet.”
On Oct. 23, 2024, as The Sarasota News Leader reported, the county commissioners approved a larger expansion of the Sheriff’s Office Headquarters — an extra 27,883 square feet of new space — plus the renovation of 23,000 square feet. The plans previously called for 56,250 square feet of new space, an Oct. 23, 2024 county staff memo said.
The construction of the initial expansion phase, Hoffman noted in an Aug. 16, 2024 letter to County Administrator Jonathan Lewis, is scheduled to get underway in the 2026 fiscal year — which will begin on Oct. 1 — and end in July 2028.
Hoffman further explained in that letter, “Approximately 77% of the project is expansion. With the rising costs of construction, taking a thoughtful approach to this critical capital project will save a significant amount of future tax dollars if planned correctly.”