The Santa Barbara County Grand Jury released a scathing report this week revealing the Santa Barbara County Sheriff’s Office is projected to nearly double its $10 million overtime budget for the 2025-2026 fiscal year, recommending sweeping changes including the closure of the South County Main Jail.
According to the report titled “What’s Up With the Excessive Overtime? A Look at the Overtime Issues in the Sheriff’s Office,” the Sheriff’s Office is expected to exceed its overtime allocation by an additional $9 million, with much of the excess attributed to overtime payments in the Custody Division.
The Sheriff’s budget now accounts for fully one-third of the General Funds available to the Board of Supervisors — up from 24 percent in 2023-2024 and 25 percent in 2024-2025.
“They do not, however, manage their overtime budget as efficiently as they do their operations,” the Grand Jury wrote, while acknowledging that Sheriff’s staff “perform difficult and necessary tasks to protect the residents of the County.”
The timing of the report comes as Santa Barbara County faces a projected $66 million budget deficit over the next five years, driven by reductions in State and Federal funding.
“In this climate, no Department should be able to spend more than is budgeted,” the report states.
The Grand Jury noted that in previous years, the Board of Supervisors has used savings from other departments to cover the Sheriff’s overages — diverting funds that could have been allocated to other community needs.
As of December 31, 2025, the Sheriff had already spent 99 percent of his allocated overtime budget with six months remaining in the fiscal year.
Root Causes Identified
The report identifies several factors contributing to the overtime crisis. The current Memorandum of Understanding between the Deputy Sheriffs’ Association and the Board of Supervisors — set to expire in late June 2026 — contains provisions allowing deputies to use accrued time such as vacation, sick leave, and comp time as “hours worked.” This means employees can be paid overtime without actually working more than 80 hours in a two-week pay period.
The Grand Jury also points to the operation of two county jails as a root cause of excessive overtime, despite jail populations declining from 1,010 inmates in January 2013 to 750 in November 2024.
Additionally, the 2021 Murray v. County of Santa Barbara federal court settlement requires specific custody staffing levels, limiting the Sheriff’s flexibility in personnel management.
Recommendations
The Grand Jury issued several specific recommendations:
- Negotiate changes to the upcoming MOU with the Deputy Sheriff’s Association to eliminate the use of accrued leave time as hours worked and cap the amount of overtime an employee can work
- Enhance management training for Sheriff’s staff, particularly regarding time management and budget controls
- Expedite implementation of a new payroll and Human Resources management system
- Create a decommissioning plan for the South County Main Jail with the goal of closing the facility as soon as possible
Progress Noted
The report acknowledges that the Board of Supervisors has already taken steps to address the issue, including asking the Auditor-Controller to investigate and implementing several measures. A new management team is now in place at the Sheriff’s Office, and the 2026-2027 Budget Workshop Presentation includes “the use of scheduling adjustments and other management controls to reduce reliance on overtime” as an anticipated accomplishment.
The Grand Jury also noted that as of March 2025, the Sheriff’s Office can be considered fully staffed with a five percent vacancy rate, and mandatory overtime hours have been significantly reduced.
“The Grand Jury is encouraged by those efforts and believes that additional measures should be implemented,” the report concludes.
The full report is available at sbcgj.org.
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A MAGA loving Sherriff that couldn’t manage a Dairy Queen. FFS stop wasting our money. He will be voted out next go around.
How much of tax payer dollars were spent on that North County Jail that we never needed? Bill Brown needs to be replaced ASAP
Yes, close the jail here, re-do the absurd and outdated MOU, and fire the current HR people. Done.
Funny how all these recommendations come from folks who have never spent one minute doing the work these folks do. Instead of recognizing their hard work. No one was writing articles all those years they were short staffed. But the moment they’re FORCED to work overtime or volunteer to keep the jails afloat it’s their fault. Give me a break! Pay these folks what they deserve and hire the staff they need to properly and safely operate the COUNTIES jail facilities.
Oh, for a moment I thought you were talking about school teachers and other public servants that cons constantly bash.
But no, it’s just another con ignoring the details laid out in the article.
Con? You’re probably one of them clowns that pushed to defund the police but first to cry when they didn’t show up on time when you called for their help. Or when you become a victim and expect these criminals to be kept behind bars and throw away the key. Sit down.
KEEP – you sound like one of those lying MAGAt who pretends to “back the blue” while they cheer for a man who rreleased hundreds of cop-beating traitors and now wants to pay them using our money.
If you voted for him, you don’t have a say in the treatment of local LE.
I smell bacon.
“Con? [followed by typical con ideation]”
They were not forced to work overtime. They love it. This is the sugar that elected Sheriff’s put out to get the support of the rank and file and why some of the highest paid government workers work in incarceration. Also, there is no reason why we should be holding mentally ill facing minor crimes in these institutions. Remove that population into more therapeutic institutions (some with restrictions on departure) and we would reduce jail overtime, relieve the unhoused problem, benefit those in crisis and make our community a lot more humane.
Very well said RHS.
They were forced to work overtime due to staffing shortages. Some of them might really love it, but others do not.
Yeah, nah. “This means employees can be paid overtime without actually working more than 80 hours in a two-week pay period.”
Too bad these folks that everyone is blaming for the county’s budget woes can’t strike. It would be interesting what would be said by all those bashing them. And yes. Close the Santa Barbara jail ASAP. Then release all those inmates housed there out to the community because there is no room in Santa Maria to house them. Then what?! The DRC, Grand Jury and BOS members should work a shift or two in these jail facilities. Then they would sing a different tune!
Nobody is ‘bashing the police.’ stop begin such a snowflake.
Taxpayers are rightly criticizing the double dipping that allows these employees to collect overtime, when they have not worked more than 80 hours in a pay period. My job doesn’t let me do that. Does yours? Srsly. And heaven forbid somebody working at minimum wage job pulled this.
It’s a clear breach of trust, and waste of taxpayer money. We have every right to ask for accountability.
The huffing and puffing about people ‘coming down on cops is overblown drama that ignores actual facts, per usual from the ‘shrink gubmint’ maggots.
Sherriff Brown is mucking it up. The department needs new leadership. From the Independent:
“Solvang is pursuing a policing change. On May 26, the city’s council voted to start negotiations with the Lompoc Police Department for law enforcement services. The current policing contract with Santa Barbara County Sheriff’s Office, county staff said, has grown increasingly expensive in the past decade, rising by 107 percent in the past decade.
“This is strictly a value awareness [with] the idea being that we don’t believe we’re getting what we’re paying for,” Solvang City Manager Randy Murphy said. “