BROOKSVILLE – On July 11, the Hernando Board of County Commissioners met to review the recommended budget for Fiscal Year 2025 at Thursday’s workshop. The plan is comprised of six major presentations: an overview, the tax collector’s office, the property appraiser’s office, the supervisor of elections office, the clerk of circuit court and comptroller’s office, and the sheriff’s office.
Due to the length of the workshop, the Sun will be splitting our budget coverage in two across a pair of articles, making this a part one of sorts. This issue will provide a breakdown of the plan as well as an overview of the proposed budget for the sheriff’s office.
Commissioner Jeffrey Rogers noted that, “this budget includes all the revenues and expenses for all the county departments and the constitutional officers.” This process involves “getting the needs and necessary requirements for all these departments to meet the level of service that is established by the board of county commissioners, and thus to serve the citizens of the county,” Rogers continued.
The commissioner insisted that this is shown by various expenditures such as the financing of a new tax collector’s building, upgrading the county jail, wastewater plant expansions, animal shelter upgrades, a landfill expansion, fire station expansions, investments in technologies for security and efficiency, and the maintenance of various facilities.
With this budget, Rogers added that the county leaders are looking to solve problems and address needs in the community. The board’s goal was to find ways to reach decisions instead of vacillating and leaving these choices “for future boards to solve.” Considering inflation and all the difficulties involved, he feels that the county has maintained a “slim budget.”
Commissioner Steve Champion cautioned against the budget growing too great. With a third straight year of taxable values increasing by double digits, he feels this is “unsustainable.” Champion feels this is crucial if the market were to hit a downturn in the next year or two, which he believes is likely. There is “a 50-plus percent decrease in building,” Champion stated. He cited a meeting with a citrus county commissioner who noted that major builders are laying off “hundreds of people across the country,” Champion continued.
Commissioner Brian Hawkins was more optimistic about market values but wanted to know how homestead values would be affected percentagewise. He floated the concept of one day keeping the taxes largely flat year-over-year except for raising the millage. Hawkins noted that once their CIP projects are completed, and if the one-cent tax passes, that will “free up a lot of money” as well.
Hernando County Budget Director Albert Bertram came forward to present the overview of the budget:
Total Budget – $889,053,402
Total Reserves – $261,013,902
General Fund – $224,203,017
GF Reserves – $44,569,989
Constitutionals – $108,500,416
Constitutional Revenues – $9,384,049
Approximately $5 million of constitutional revenues is the sheriff’s office
The remainder is the clerk’s allocation for IT services
Expense By Budget Type (Percent of Budget):
Budget Reserves – $261,013,902 (29.4%)
Capital Outlay – $186,591,706 (21%)
Operation Expenses – $137,226,725 (15.4%)
Personnel Services – $121,642,014 (13.7%)
Non-operating – $107,788,751 (12.1%)
Transfers – $53,072,821 (6%)
Debt Service – $15,823,480 (1.8%)
Grants & Aid – $5,894,003 (0.7%)
Budget Increase from FY24 to Recommended FY25 (Percent Increase):
Total Budget – $767,373,154 to 889,053,402 (15.86%)
Net Budget – $259,049,034 to $280,586,222 (8.31%)
Tax Value Increase of 10.53%
Revenues Budgeted at 95%
Fire Union and County Salary Increases of 4%
Proposed Millage Rate – 6.6997 (unchanged from FY24)
Toward the end of Thursday’s meeting, Sheriff Al Nienhuis came before the board to discuss the proposed budget for the sheriff’s office. He noted that his department was at least as transparent as any other sheriff’s office in Florida regarding the submitted budget letter. Hernando is “extremely fiscally conservative,” Nienhuis stated, and this is demonstrated by the county’s ranking of 56 in the state (out of 67) when it comes to public safety expenditures per capita (Florida Tax Watch FY 2020-2021). Public expenditures include law enforcement, fire control, protective inspections, emergency and disaster relief, ambulance and rescue services, medical examiners and consumer affairs. Crime has continued to drop in the county and the HCSO’s case closure rate is “about one-and-a-half times the national average,” Nienhuis continued.
The total expenses for the HCSO for FY2025 are currently proposed to equal $85,208,430. This is up from $77,895,773 in 2024 – a 9 percent increase year-over-year. The proposed revenues of $4,996,180 would amount to a 5 percent increase. 4.73 percent of the department’s total budget increase is related to personnel costs that are mandated by the state. That is over half the recommended increase being put towards compulsory funds that will directly help the staff.
Hawkins applauded the work that Nienhuis and company are doing to operate on a lower percentage of funds as the sheriff’s office now receives 35 cents versus 45 cents on the dollar that they received from the General Fund a decade ago. Champion was resistant to approving an 8-plus percent increase in budgeting and will try to work with Sheriff Nienhuis to decrease those numbers.
However, according to Sheriff Nienhuis the HCSO is already running cheaper than most other counties across the state, so making efforts within his organization to slash the budget could prove to be a tall order. The department already reduced the number of “positions requested” from 70 to 20 once they whittled the amount down to the most necessary.
Commissioner Jerry Campbell was appreciative of the amount of money that the sheriff’s office has saved the county and its taxpayers under Nienhuis’s leadership and wants to make sure his offices have enough to do their jobs. “I think the sheriff’s office is doing a fantastic job of using their resources,” Commissioner Campbell said. “They need to be able to have access to the tools necessary to do their job and to minimize that cost.” The 2014 Sheriff’s office budget was $41,070,491.
Final changes to the budget will be made in public hearings later this year. If citizens wish to review any portion of the recommended budget themselves, the meeting and information can be found on the Hernando County Government website.
