County budget shows increases to personnel, decreases in reserves

The first round of Pennington County Budget hearings took place July 8-9.

As department heads presented their request to the county commission one theme was apparent—spending is up and reserves are down.

Another trend that is also easy to spot is the increasing number of employees at the county level. In 2023 the county had 826 full-time employees and in 2024 it had 855. While many department heads cited growth as the need for employees, numbers show a 2022 population of 114,461 versus 117,500 in 2024. The county added about 8,200 people since 2016 (projected to be close to 10,000 by 2025) and 159 employees.

The county expects to see about 1,500 new residents in 2025. Commissioners authorized a wage study for the county in February 2023, the results of which were discussed by the compensation committee  at the budget hearings. The committee suggested five different wage scales: professional, technical, support, public safety and medical. The hourly rates for each scale varied with the minimum  for all scales at $16.87 and the highest at $89.93.

All county employees were given 1.5 percent cost of living adjustment (COLA) and placed on the new 2025 proposed scale at the lowest step, where they did not lose money, said committee members. This cost taxpayers $2.2 million dollars. Auditor Cindy Mohler calls payroll the county’s largest expense.

The provisional budget also shows double digit increases for things such as IT and GIS while the bulk come from law enforcement and court services like the Pivot Point program, the detox center, the innovations in reentry initiatives program,  the public defender’s office, and the state’s attorney office.

The county commissioners office line item itself  proposes a 15.97 percent  increase over last year. This includes a 1.5 percent COLA for commissioners, 

Personnel seem to be the theme for most department requests. 

Sheriff Brian Mueller, along with highway department head Joe Miller, presented the study compensation results at the budget hearings.

Mueller some positions were “way out of whack” in terms of compensation. This includes highway workers, appraisers, custodians, tax and title specialists, attorneys and public safety people.

The county is spending $2.2 million dollars to implement the suggested wage increases, an amount that  does not include a $900,000 offset from the general fund. 

The highway department currently has 55 full-time employees and is asking for one additional worker. However, the department does not see a need for more employees beyond this budget cycle, although Miller did express his desire to stay competitive in terms of wages in the industry and keeping the  personnel he has.

“If I had a choice between people and doing more projects, absolutely people,” heaid. “Without people we don’t get our roads plowed, we don’t get our roads repaired.”

Commissioner Deb Hadcock reminded Miller during the hearings that the county does not compete with private industry when looking at salaries, but Miller held steadfast, reminding  the commissioner about the $2.5 million shortfall his department operated under for a six-year span until the county wheel tax was implemented. 

Mueller agreed with Miller’s sentiment about competitive wages as he addressed the commissioners. Mueller cited his department’s consistent innovation at generating revenue.

“We’re generating that revenue with incredible work by incredible employees,” he said. “Without our wages being competitive I'm not gonna be able to tell you that year after year.”

Mueller is requesting over a half million dollars in wage increases for the 2025 budget, although the overall salary increase for law enforcement is just over 3 percent, a percentage  that does not include salary increases at the detox center and Pivot Point.

The county law enforcement budget request shows the Pennington County Jail currently employs 172 full- time people, spends about $1 million on overtime pay due to shortages in staffing and houses 662 inmates,

Overall, there are 13 full-time employees various departments are requesting, including three for the public defender’s office and two for the state’s attorney. The net cost to the county for these five positions alone are over $500,000.

Eric Whitcher of the public defender’s office  reviewed 2023. His office saw 5,826 cases assigned, 1,623 of which were felonies. Most of these resulted in plea bargains.  The department had 16 attorneys in 2023.

Whichter said South Dakota is tied for second to last for attorneys per capita in the country, saying they are “expensive” in this state.

“It’s going to continue to be a challenge for Pennington County to hire state’s attorneys and public defenders,” he said.

Whitcher’s office set 218 cases for trial. Of those, 144 were dismissed, 14 cases  were tried and of those only three were found guilty.

He sees for 2025 an increase in cases, new caseload standards, a tight lawyer labor market and additional expenses for first degree murder mitigation expenses. This includes a witness budget in first degree murder cases. Any death penalty case has a minimum of $500,000 in additional expenses. In 2025, Whicher is asking for an increasing $250,000 for expert witnesses which he says is “on average 400 hours per case.”

The state’s attorney office shows a slight increase in felony cases for 2023, but an increase of about 300 misdemeanor cases when compared to 2022. 

About half of all the felony cases the county sees are drug related. State’s attorney Lara Roetzel  said,  “drug cases, I will tell you, are significantly impacting our individuals, our families and our community in Pennington County. It’s methamphetamine and  it’s fentanyl. It’s tearing our community apart. It’s a war that we quite simply are not winning.” 

Its office has also seen a rise in thefts.

Buildings and grounds is asking for a 6.41 percent increase for 2025. This number does not include its requested full time employees, which would increase that percentage up to 9.6 percent. The department needs four additional personnel due to the county’s new building at 900 Concourse. That building is projected to cost nearly $100,000 in utility payments for 2025.

The department of equalization asked for a 1.7 percent increase in its budget this year. However, a memo from Shannon Rittberger, director of the department, indicated that his office has an appraiser position open.

“The last appraiser quit because she found another job for significantly more pay and less stress,” Rittbrger’s memo said, with the employee citing “irate taxpayers” as the stressor during the appeals process.

Rittberger did add $10,000 to his budget due to, as he put it during  the budget hearing, “seeing more serious appeals on the larger valued properties” in the county. Rittberger said his budget request in the next couple of years will look different, saying that the county’s assessed value has doubled in the last decade.

“I will need new appraisers. Expect to see that in the next year or two,” he said.

Salaries for his department are upwards of $3.8 million dollars In 2022 that number was $2.8 million.

The county is sitting with less in unassigned reserves. Normally the county collects anywhere from 3-10 percent in over collected revenue, which gets placed in those reserves. In 2023  that number  was less than 1 percent. 

“I do think we need to look for other revenue sources. Obviously (with) these ongoing expenditures  we can’t continue doing what we’re doing in letting our reserves go down too far,” said Mohler said.

Mohler minced no words in stating this in her budget hearing memo.

“I would caution that moving forward it will be necessary to continue to seek out other revenue sources, other than property taxes, to support the budget in addition to ways to gain efficiencies in use of personnel and operations,” she wrote.

Mohler  also noted in that memo to county commissioners  that “the overall General Fund proposed budget has increased $4,588,624. The General Fund tax revenue increase is $2,527,389 and miscellaneous revenues have increased $1,223,143.”

Mohler further adds “while Pennington County hasn’t necessarily seen stagnant growth there has been a considerable amount of growth that the county is unable to use because that growth is happening in Tax Increment Financing (TIF) Districts. This means the growth that is happening within the TIF districts is not contributing any additional property tax revenue to cover the increase in the cost of services that the county is required to provide. Even though it is argued that once the TIF is dissolved the county will be able to gain the growth of that district I would ask, how many years after the time the initial services are required to be provided does the revenue from that growth become reality for the county?”

The commissioners will hold a special meeting and work session on the budget July 18 at 8 am in the Commission Chambers at 130 Kansas City St. in Rapid City.