The Daviess County Sheriff’s Office’s 2026 budget includes six new positions that Sheriff Brad Youngman said are needed to address county growth, increased court activity, and rising investigative demands.
The budget, approved Thursday by Daviess County Fiscal Court, totals $8,283,748.35 for the calendar year, according to Daviess County Treasurer Jordan Johnson. Of that total, $7,248,998.35 is allocated for salaries. The plan requires a $4,991,813.89 subsidy from Fiscal Court.
“It’s been a long time since the sheriff’s office has added positions, and from where I’m sitting, it’s overdue,” Youngman said. “I think even previous sheriffs would agree that during their time, this agency could have benefited from additional personnel.”
Johnson told Fiscal Court that total salaries are increasing by $801,500.34 compared to the sheriff’s amended 2025 budget. The increase reflects a 2.9% cost-of-living adjustment approved by Fiscal Court, a 1% merit step increase, salary adjustments tied to promotions and performance incentives, and the addition of six new positions.
Those new positions include a court security officer supervisor, two court security officer I positions, a detective, and two deputies. Johnson said the total cost of the additional personnel is $578,240.16, fully loaded with benefits. Three of the court security positions will be partially offset by $93,600 in state reimbursement from the Administrative Office of the Courts.
Youngman said roughly half of the new positions will strengthen court security, while the others will support patrol and investigative operations. He said staffing pressures have increased as development continues in the unincorporated areas of Daviess County.
“Talking with planning and zoning, there was data that showed that we’ve added about 1,000 homes in the last five years in the unincorporated portions of the county,” Youngman said. “If there are two or three people in those houses, that’s a lot of people. That’s a lot more traffic problems, a lot more disturbances, a lot more disorderly conduct — just the problems that society brings with them.”
Youngman said the growth has contributed to a shift in how deputies spend their shifts, leaving less time for proactive work.
“When you look at how much time during a deputy’s typical shift they’re responding, it does not always allow time for the proactive things that we like to be known for,” he said. “If we’re constantly responding, then we’re not able to do that.”
One of the new positions will support the sheriff’s office’s narcotics investigations unit.
“We started a narcotics investigations unit about three years ago, and they’ve been very, very busy,” Youngman said. “They put up a lot of data, so I was able to use that data to justify a fourth narcotics detective.”
Youngman said the remaining new positions in court security will address both staffing limitations and structural challenges at the Judicial Center.
“That Judicial Center is getting busier and busier all the time, it feels like,” he said. “The architecture of that building presents challenges to being able to secure it.”
He cited the building’s single public elevator, four floors of stairs, and the emotional nature of some court proceedings — particularly in family court — as factors that increase the need for strategically deployed security staff.
“When you have a trial where there’s a lot of emotions, the victim’s family and the suspect’s family may be on the elevator together,” Youngman said. “We’ve seen that create problems that our security has to respond to.”
Johnson told Fiscal Court that despite the additional staff, the sheriff’s office is not requesting additional vehicles. The department plans to hold vehicles scheduled for replacement for an extra year and use a seized vehicle if needed. The vehicle replacement schedule is expected to remain at five units per year.
Johnson said the higher subsidy reflects both the addition of personnel and the fact that the sheriff’s office ended 2025 with little unspent funding.
Youngman acknowledged that his office’s budget has increased in each of his first years in office, but said the growth has been intentional and phased.
“My first year’s budget was about being fully staffed,” he said. “The following year, we had some technological needs. This next budget will be addressing growth. We’ll get to a point here soon where we just sustain what we have. That means the sheriff’s office is where we needed it to be.”
