HomeMy WebLinkAboutCitizens Budget Committee 6-19-15o
Meeting Date: June 19, 2015
Conference Room 3
MEMBERS PRESENT: Ron Knaggs, Chair
Dan Kurek, Vice Chair
Stephanie Morgan
Steven Weaver
Gwen Morris
Richard Pancoast
John Culverhouse
Craig Mundt
William Donovan
Patrick Campion
Ed Lounds
Carl Hensley
Ron Parrish
James Clasby
MEMBERS ABSENT: Jay L. McBee
OTHERS PRESENT: Howard Tipton
Robert Adolphe
Mark Satterlee
Asheley Hepburn
Jennifer Hill
Toby Long
Beth Ryder
Ed Matthews
John Wiatrak
Garry Wilson
Don West
Kathryn Hensley
Laurie Waldie
Leslie Olson
Carl Holeva
Angela Bradley
Shai Francis
Susan Jacob
CALL TO ORDER
Mr. Knaggs called the meeting to order at 7:30 a.m. and welcomed Mr. Tipton, Mr.
Adolphe and the Sheriff's representatives. Mr. Knaggs referenced Mr. Long's attached
email.
PUBLIC COMMENT
Mr. Lounds expressed his concern about absence of the maintenance of guard rails. Mr.
Tipton thanked Mr. Lounds and informed him that it had been discussed and will be
checked. No member of the public spoke at the meeting.
APPROVAL OF JUNE 5, 2015 MINUTES
After a motion and second, the minutes were unanimously approved.
Citizens' Budget Committee
June 19, 2015
Page 3
STAFFING LEVELS
The attached Position Count chart was distributed. Mr. Hepburn pointed out the trend.
The numbers are approved full time equivalent (FTE) employees of the BOCC. Mr. Tipton
added information about Manpower positions.
Mr. Tipton said budgets are always difficult because you always have more needs than
resources. It is always give and take. The members of the Sheriff's office are friends and
respected. It is just a difficult balancing act.
Mr. Tipton reported that the State legislative session was strange and bizarre. No water
projects were approved. Amendment dollars were not allocated. Hospital funding was
kicked down the road. We plan to have a more strategic approach in the future. The
meetings will be in January next year.
Mr. Lounds asked about unfunded mandates. Water quality issues were discussed.
OTHERISSUES
Ms. Morgan told history and her concern that the Committee does not have presentations
from individual departments or Constitutionals. Mr. Knaggs explained the timing issues
and priorities. Mr. Lounds gave his opinion on the responsibilities of Administration and
the Committee.
Mr. Knaggs asked about a schedule for the Budget Reviews with BOCC. The schedule
will be sent to the members when available. He reminded the members that there will be
a Committee meeting on Friday, July 17rn
ADJOURNMENT
Mr. Knaggs thanked everyone for coming and adjourned the meeting at 9:13 a.m.
Respectfully submitted by: Brenda Marlin
The next CBC meeting will be held on Friday, July 17, 2015, at 7:30 a.m., in Conference
Room 3, at the St. Lucie County Roger Poitras Administration Annex.
l' L()R! C7A
� � ;. IL- / -`'
KEN J, MASCARA
Telephone: (772) 462-3200 • Fax: (772) 489-5851 `� `! �''
4700 West Nlidi vay Road - Fort Pierce, Florida 34981 'ICCRC!)['I Nio
June 15, 2015
Ron Knaggs, Chairman
Citizen's Budget Review Committee
Dear Mr, Knaggs:
I want to thank you for inviting Chief Financial Officer Toby Long and me to
address the Citizens Budget Review Committee to discuss my proposed 2015-2016
budget.
I greatly appreciated the committee members' attention, questions and subsequent
support of my proposed budget.
There was one question by committee member Stephanie Morgan. She requested an
explanation of the Contractual Services costs (line 47). At the time of the meeting,
we did not have the breakdown of the costs, The Contractual Services costs include:
$115,000 for services with SE Technologies and American Date Group; $45,000 for
services and maintenance to our range; $10,000 for Waste Pro and $5,000 for
security monitoring.
There was also discussion about the. per capita costs of other Florida Sheriffs
Offices of similar sizes. I have included the list of the proposed 2015-2016 funding
requests and per capita costs of seven other Florida Sheriffs Offices for the counties
of: Martin, Indian River, Collier, Manatee, Alachua, Lake, and Leon. I am proud to
say that we are the third -lowest -per -capita -cost Sheriffs Office behind the Lake
County Sheriffs Office and Leon County Sheriffs Office.
Finally, there was an extended discussion on how the number of mentally ill
inmates in our community has affected our jail population. It was noted that four of
every 10 inmates have some form of mental illness.
I have attached an April 10, 2015 New York Times story, "FOR MENTALLY ILL
INMATES, a Cycle of Jail and Hospitals," for the review of the committee members.
I also have attached the recent National Sheriffs Association statement that
Sheriffs have long supported funding and resources to make more space available at
mental health facilities so that individuals with mental illness can receive the
treatment they truly need.
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For Mentally I11 Inmates, a Cycle of Jail and Hospitals
Page 1 of 13
For of • Hospitals
The New York Times
By MICHAEL WINERIP and MICHAEL SCHWIRTZ
4j10/?U1S
f SHARE V TWEET i% EMAIL
http://www.msn,comlen-us/news/crime/far-mentally-ill-inmates-a-cycle-of-jail-and-hospit... 6/15/2015
For Mentally III Inmates, a Cycle of Jail and Hospitals
Page 3 of 13
The New York Times spent 10 months examining Mr. Megginson's troubled life, conducting
hours of interviews with him as well as his family members, doctors and lawyers. With his
permission, The Times also reviewed thousands of pages of medical, disciplinary and legal
records from his time at Rikers and in hospitals, community programs and supervised
housing.
Though there may be a consensus that Michael Megginson does not belong in jail, there is
no agreement about where else he could go. At times, he was just as violent in hospitals. He
oncejumped over a nurses' station at Kings County Hospital Center in Brooklyn, attacking
clinicians; during a stay in St. Barnabas Hospital in the Bronx, he was placed in restraints 11
times.
But unlike jail, psychiatric hospitals treated his behavior as a symptom of illness, If he was
out of control, he was often given an injection to knock him out and was placed in a quiet
room until he was calm.
In interviews, members of Mr. Megginson's family said they believed that longer -term
hospitalization would be best for him. But that option has all but disappeared. For the last
four decades, the push in the mental health field has been to close these hospitals. Since a
1970s Supreme Court ruling that was meant to protect civil liberties, only the very sickest
pati nts can be involuntarily held for an extended period.
Vr. egg inson was repeatedly released from state hospitals against his doctors` wishis"
bec use he did not meet legal requirements for involuntary commitment.
His treatment has cost millions of dollars in public funds. Outside of hospitals, he was
enrolled in some of the most successful outpatient and community programs in the mental
health field.
He failed out of all of them.
Which raises the question: Is there any place for Michael Megginson?
Over the last decade, the proportion of inmates with diagnosed mental illness has climbed
dramatically. Today, they make up nearly 40 percent of the population at Rikers, a total of
4,000 men and women at any given time, more than all the adult patients in New York State
psychiatric hospitals combined.
Several have shown that they are more likely than other inmates to be the victims as well as
the perpetrators of violence.
http://www.msn.comlen-us/newslerimelfor-mentally-ill-inmates-a-eyele-of jail-and-hospit... 6/15/2015
For Mentally Ill Inmates, a Cycle of Jail and Hospitals
Page 5 of 13
Many members of his extended family had mental illness and substance abuse problems.
His paternal grandparents were both alcoholics, and his maternal grandfather died after
falling out a window — or possibly jumping.
His mother, Shakima Smith -White, acknowledged that she was not always there for her son
initially. But she said she re-entered his life full-time when he started school. She has been
married now for 20 years, works two jobs and is studying to be a nurse practitioner.
"We weren't perfect, but we tried with Michael," she said.
When he was 5, she said, she took him to Miami on her honeymoon, to her husband's
dismay. And when Michael was going through a bad stretch in his late teens, she said, her
husband took their two daughters and moved out, worried it was too dangerous to stay.
"He pretty much gave me an ultimatum, that it was him or Michael," she said. "And I chose
my son."
"At the time he needed me more than the girls or my husband," she said.
When Mr. Megginson was doing well, she said, he was wonderful to be around — calm,
affectionate, funny.
"No mally something would happen that would be like a great disappointment," she �icl.
"Or omeone would anger him and he would Kash out, and from there he would just s isal
do nwards."
In an interview at Rikers, Mr. Megginson said his great-grandmother had been the most
important person in his life. When he was 10 and she died, he said, it was devastating. "The
way my mental illness led to an outbreak of getting worse was when my great-grandmother
passed," he said. "It tore my insides out and gave me a lot of darkness."
By age 12, he had been admitted to Bronx Children's Psychiatric Center four times,
according to medical records, and in his teens spent time at a Manhattan group home for
young people with behavioral problems. Between hospital stays he often lived with his
mother, and for a while, she said, she could calm him when he was upset. When he was 19,
though, they got into a vicious fight. After he started swearing at her, she said, she struck
him. He punched her back, knocking out two teeth, grabbed a knife and tried to stab her,
she said.
She called 911 and he was arrested, spending three months at Rikers.
http:llwww.msn.com/en-us/news/crime/for-mentally-i ll-inmates-a-cycle-of-jail-and-hospit... 6/ 15/2015
For Mentally III Inmates, a Cycle of Jail and Hospitals Page 7 of 13
While the system still suffers from serious shortages, today there are 40,500 state -funded
supervised beds where mentally ill people have regular access to clinicians, twice as many as
15 years ago.
One of the most significant innovations available to Mr. Megginson is the Assertive
Community Treatment program, or ACT, which is made up of a team that includes a
psychiatrist, nurses, social workers and a substance abuse counselor. It is theirjob to make
sure that even the most troubled individuals stick with their treatment. The idea is to avoid
costly hospitalizations while enabling people to live safely in the community.
The state requires an ACT team to have a caseload of no more than 68 people and to see
each client at least six times a month. There are 46 such teams in New York City, 82
statewide.
On a recent Tuesday, seven members of an East Harlem -based ACT team, who work fora
nonprofit agency called the Bridge, met for several hours to discuss each of their 68 clients.
Among their concerns: a man with a history of suicide attempts whose cousin had recently
killed himself, three people with addiction problems who needed to provide urine samples;
a man who was being lewd; and a new client with a history of assault who was acting
belligerent toward staff members, "He might need another mood stabilizer," said Aneeza
Ali, he team leader. "Or an attitude check."
Sta ing when he was 18 and after numerous hospitalizations, Mr. Megginson was ass ned
at Iast twice to ACT teams including the Bridge program. After he assaulted his mot r in
2009, he was mandated under Kendra's Law to enroll with an ACT team asa condition of his
probation.
His mother said her son seemed happier in the program because he could live on his own.
"He always wanted to feel normal," she said, adding, "It gave him a sense of 'I'm O.K., I'm
like everyone else.' "
ACT teams get high marks from activists. Susan Garrison, a social worker and a member of
the Harlem chapter of the National Alliance on Mental Illness, said the program had made a
big difference in her son's life. At 45, despite having severe schizophrenia, he has been able
to stay out of the hospital, and at times he has even held a job, including recently working
seven hours a week at a Rite Aid in Harlem.
But as good as ACT is, Ms. Garrison said, her constant involvement in her son's life has been
crucial. Without an anchor — a parent, a spouse, a sibling — a person will often go off
treatment and deteriorate, she said,
http.//www. msn.com/en-us/news/critne/£or-mental ly-i ll-irunates-a-cycle-of--j ail-and-hospit... 6/ 15/2015
For Mentally I11 Inmates, a Cycle of Jail and Hospitals
Page 9 of 13
Observing a person during an extended hospitalization may improve a psychiatrist's
chances of establishing a reliable diagnosis. It can also provide a safe environment, in which
a variety of medications and dosages can be calibrated to the patient's needs.
In a hospital, Mr. Megginson would be compelled to take his medication, which would help
curtail his aggression. At Rikers, clinicians say, inmates frequently go off their medication
until they become uncontrollably violent.
Under state law, patients cannot be held against their will unless they are an immediate
danger to themselves or others. During several hospitalizations, Mr. Megginson appeared
before judges and successfully challenged his confinement. Though doctors disagreed, they
had to release him.
His final hospital stay before Rikers lasted five months and ended on a hopeful note. A
psychiatrist wrote that he was taking medication and attending substance abuse programs,
that his grooming and hygiene had improved and that he was "free of psychotic features."
"He was very proud of his accomplishment," an April 22, 2013, progress note said, "and
anxious to move on to independent living."
But fter being discharged to a housing program, Mr. Megginson deteriorated rapidly He
stopped attending treatment sessions, according to medical records, and started drinfing
heavily and abusing marijuana. On June 12, he hit a counselor in the face with a cell ne
Y gply
cha ger and was kicked out of the program. Two months later, he stole a woman's
cellphone and was sent to Rikers.
Several prosecutors, judges, police and correction officials said in interviews that they were
frustrated by the lack of options for keeping people like Mr. Megginson out of jail.
Karen Friedman Agnifilo, the chief assistant district attorney in Manhattan, said she would
like to have an alternative to jail for certain convicted offenders who are seriously mentally
ill, such as a voluntary confinement that would provide treatment while keeping them off
the streets.
"The problem is these individuals have typically been offered every service available," Ms
Friedman Agnifilo said. "As a result, we have no choice but to continue to cycle them
through the system. We wish we could do something else, but we don't know what that
something else is."
At this point few, if any, alternatives exist for offenders,
http://www. msn.conilen-us/news/crime/for-mental ly-i ll-inmates-a-cycle-of-jail-and-hospit,,. 6/ 15/2015
For Mentally Ill Inmates, a Cycle of Jail and Hospitals
Page I 1 of 13
Correction officers, led by union leaders, have long called solitary confinement the most
effective punishment for violent inmates. But Chief Murphy said in an interview that the
intensive therapy had worked better.
Mr. Megginson spoke fondly of the therapist. He said she had taught him "just to use my
thinking instead of using my fists. Like, if I get in an incident with an officer; instead of
resolving it in a violent manner, rather just, you know, walk away sometimes. I try to think it
out, think what I'm doing first and try to alleviate the situation."
In the weeks before leaving Rikers, he sounded optimistic, saying he hoped to get a job in
building maintenance. "I'm just a one-time felon," he said, "and my felony is very light. If I
had two felonies on my record or three, then it would be rough. I still got a chance. I believe
in opportunity."
Two months ago, Mr. Megginson pleaded guilty to stealing the cellphone as well as to the
assaults on the officers. He was given a one -to -three -yeas prison sentence and, because of
his time served at Rikers, was immediately eligible for parole.
On Feb. 18, he was transferred to Downstate Correctional Facility in Fishkill for what was
supposed to be a short stay. He had a parole hearing scheduled for mid -March and his
la er, Jane Pucher, had started looking for a therapeutic program for him in the city.
Bbt i t the prison, he was unable to hold himself together. On Feb. 26, he was discipli d'for
threatening to cut an officer, according to state prison records. On March 4 and 6, he�ot
into fights with inmates, and on March 7 he was written up for smashing a table against a
door.
Then on March 15, according to records, he defecated on his cell floor, smeared his feces
on the window as well as a security camera and jumped on the metal bed frame until it
broke off the wall. When guards arrived, he threw his feces at them.
A few days later, he was transferred to Central New York Psychiatric Center, a state
maximum -security forensic hospital, located in Marcy.
In an interview there on Wednesday, Mr. Megginson said he had lost control in prison
because he had stopped receiving his medication. Other inmates repeatedly picked on him,
he said.
But in the last three weeks at the hospital, he said, things are going well: He is back on his
medication, working out and planning to attend church on Sunday.
http://www.msn.comden-us/news/cri me/for-menta l ly-i I I-i nmates-a-cycle-of-j ail-and-hospit... 6/ 15/2015
For Mentally I11 Inmates, a Cycle of Jail and Hospitals
Page 13 of 13
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Presentation • FY 2016,
General Fund/Fine Forfeiture
• e l
COUNT t
Agenda
• Taxable Property Values
• Millage Rates
• Ad Valorem Revenue Outlook
• Non -Ad Valorem Revenue Outlook
• FY 2016 Budget (Department Requested)
• General Fund/ Fine & Forfeiture
• Examples of Deferred Needs/Request
1
9
• • • N
General Fund and Fine & Forfeiture Ad Valorem Taxes
$180,00,000 -.. .... .__......-.. _....._._.... ...._._
$160,000,000 -----H7.. S152,0031.857
$125,470,829 $114,311,262
$120,000,000 .. 7j"
... ............ -. .. .
®......
$97,786,856 $100,339,025 $101,345,826
$80,000,000 - - - -- - - -- $100,866,073 _ $96665,254 $95,888,091
$60,000,000 ... ........... _.. ............_ -... .__......... ..........
$40,000,000 ... .. _'___..._ ..... ............ .......__._. .. -
$20,000,000 . ....... ... .... .......... ,... , _. _.., _
$0 _.._ -- - - -... ..... - -. ...-..- ... -.....
2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 201S 2016
- ZVdTo re
-
Revenue Outlook
80� .... r-, _...,.-. .....
_..
...____ - _.
60%
...
SOY 01,15 ......._._.... ,194,11 _..._.... _. ,715,57 3....._...
_....
401A-----
.642,7
,661,1
3,777700
30Y...... ........_._... ._..._.... ..
201A..._.. .__._._..._ ... ..._._... _._....,,....._
...........
10'h ....... ._......-. ............ .. ......._...-__
_..... .........
063,060.._....
0y, Actual. Actual Actual
Actual
Budget
Recomm.
FY11 FY12 FY13
FY19
FY15
FY16
O BleaHk Franchlse 2,175,511 2,640,942 2,795,968
31692,114
3,811,131
3,879,800
,e Loc lCommunicatiOns ServicesTx - -
927,660
972,835
! 925,000
❑Half Cent Sales Tax 901,155 2,394,816 2,715,578
3,642,779
_.
3,66.1,193
_..
3,777,700
■State Revenue Sharing 2,504,804 2,642,335 2,840,796
3,070,595
3,302,635
3,063,006
I ar
3
pmp.__—
Budget 1-4-5-75-51928
Fund/Fine•
Board Supported
Depts.
50,408,361
35%
Constitutional Officers
CRAB
- 80,594,561
3,043,000...,
55%
2%
Community Service
Mandates
3,S55,683
-- —
no -
Aid to Private Agencies
Judicial Agencies }BOCC
-Constitutional2,973,319
2,069,027
3,11977
2%
1%
2%
., .,ja,c,..,.,,. .
Incremental
Changes
• Incremental Recurring Revenues
Property Taxes
$ 4.5 M
Mosquito Control Shift
$0.14M
State Shared
$ 0.2M
Half Cent Sales Tax
$ OAM
Total Increment
$4.9M
• Incremental Recurring
Savings
Transportation Debt
$ 2.OM
Total Available
$6.9M
7/7/2015
0