Sheriff pitches slight budget increase

After cutting his department's budget more than $36 million in the current fiscal year, Clark County Sheriff Doug Gillespie is proposing a slight increase for the next budget year.

The proposed budget of $518 million is a 1.14 percent increase and includes elimination of 18 civilian positions on top of the 69 police and 139 civilian positions that were cut in the current budget.

At Tuesday's Clark County Commission meeting, Gillespie emphasized the "tentative" in his budget.

Gillespie said he knows the final budget figure will be lower after likely union concessions and more budget cuts.

"The cost of doing business has gone up," he told the commission.

As last year proved, the proposal can be much different from the final budget.

In 2010, Gillespie proposed a $523 million tentative budget that would have cut 172 positions, including 30 police officer jobs. Two months later, a $10 million drop in property tax revenues led to a total elimination of 234 positions, including 69 police officers.

Nobody was laid off; all the positions were vacant.

The tentative budget also includes $31.4 million from the Police Department's funding reserves. Using the reserves will keep the total amount paid by Clark County and Las Vegas unchanged, though the county's share of the budget will rise about $1.6 million because of a change in the funding formula.

Several commissioners asked about the reserve balance, now at $84 million.

Gillespie warned against dipping further into the reserves, saying they will likely be needed to balance future budgets or pay for any major incident, he said.

"It's going to be more difficult this time around; there's no doubt about it," the sheriff said of the budget process. "But I believe we are up to the challenge."

Contact reporter Brian Haynes at bhaynes@review
journal.com or 702-383-0281.