{"id":53697,"date":"2022-06-20T18:01:12","date_gmt":"2022-06-20T22:01:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/?p=53697"},"modified":"2022-06-20T18:01:17","modified_gmt":"2022-06-20T22:01:17","slug":"what-is-in-the-lee-county-sheriffs-offices-latest-budget-proposal-and-how-much-protection-is-lehigh-acres-getting","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/2022\/06\/what-is-in-the-lee-county-sheriffs-offices-latest-budget-proposal-and-how-much-protection-is-lehigh-acres-getting\/","title":{"rendered":"What is in the Lee County Sheriff\u2019s Office\u2019s latest budget proposal and how much protection is Lehigh Acres getting?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The Lee County Sheriff\u2019s Office is proposing a hike in the budget to fight crime and the cost of living.<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"\"<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n

LCSO is proposing a 12.2% increase over last year<\/strong>. This is as we see an increase in violent crime and prices rising because of inflation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thousands of people have moved to Lee County since the start of the pandemic, and there\u2019s nothing to suggest that\u2019s going to stop.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We have sun, surf sand, and when it comes to crime, \u201cWe have law and order, and I\u2019m going to make certain of it,\u201d said Lee County Sheriff Carmine Marceno.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Marceno knows crime has decreased 59% in the last decade, but violent crime has increased in the last five years.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

He wants a 12.2% hike in his budget, totaling $241 million<\/strong> to fight that.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lee County Commissioner Brian Hamman said tax revenue is way up, so Lee County can afford it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cBecause we stayed open during the pandemic and have people moving here, we have seen a big surplus, meaning we have taken more money in than we have spent,\u201d said Hamman.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sheriff office will tell us how which money is in the budget for Lehigh Acres?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But according to the sheriff\u2019s budget proposal, a big chunk of the money will go toward replacing big-ticket items like the LCSO helicopter, plane, and a portion of his fleet of patrol cars.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The sheriff said his office needs to upgrade the forensics software too.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Another large pool of money will go toward raising the pay for deputies and staff because of the rising cost of living due to inflation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The sheriff praised the commissioners for their support.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThey don\u2019t just talk. They come up with action, and they do everything we can to make sure public safety is the number one concern,\u201d said Marceno.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Among the other items in the budget proposal are a $32,000 salary increase to $210,000 for the sheriff<\/strong>, money to replace drones that will no longer be allowed under state law at the end of the year, and funding for the digitizing of old records.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lee County commissioners will begin debating the budget on Tuesday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Lee County Sheriff\u2019s Office is proposing a hike in the budget to fight crime and the cost of living. LCSO is proposing a 12.2% increase over last year. This… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":44014,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[83],"tags":[1370],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53697"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=53697"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53697\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":53698,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53697\/revisions\/53698"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/44014"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=53697"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=53697"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=53697"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}