While she doesn’t hold the purse-strings — that’s the purview of the Porter County Council — Auditor Karen Martin on Thursday asked Sheriff Jeff Balon if his list of asks for 2026 are wants or needs.
“I don’t want it to be two, three months down the road and we don’t have enough to cover our draws in June,” Martin said early in the budget workshop after talk of offering better longevity pay to Balon’s staff.
It was the third of four workshops being held to ease the budgeting process ahead of fall budget hearings. Balon brought along Sheriff’s Office Comptroller Kathy Gaskovich and Chief Deputy Tim Manteuffel to discuss a range of fiscal topics from grants that have dried up to new expenditures he’d like to make next year.
Chief among those is adding five new patrolmen a year for five years. Even at that rate Balon said the department would be woefully understaffed compared to the level of 2.5 patrolmen per 1,000 residents recommended by the FBI. Balon said unincorporated Porter County has 70,000 residents.
“We should have 106 more cops,” he said. “We’re behind the 8 ball as a county and as we’re trying to catch up, other counties are moving ahead.” LaPorte County is often held up as the one to chase.
Some other changes Balon would like to make to his department to compete with other counties and municipalities that offer more compensation to their officers both in wages and fringe benefits, including a significant bump in longevity pay. Currently, county employees with three years with the county receive longevity pay of $225. Balon would like to raise it for his department to $1,000.
That would add an additional $273,000 to the $350,000 the county currently spends annually on longevity. “I’m not trying to alienate the Sheriff’s Department from the rest of the county,” Balon said, just trying to compete with other police departments that have better longevity.
More Top Picks Best Laptops For Engineering Students
“We talked about how longevity needed to be increased, but they went for raises instead,” said County Councilman Mike Brickner, R-At-Large, of the discussion in October last year, though the longevity increase Brickner suggested at the time was a few hundred dollars, not the $1,000 Balon is seeking, and the raise was 3% across the board.
“There’s nothing wrong behind the idea for the incentives, but it’s just going to come down to timing,” Brickner added. “I would challenge any department here, you included, to be creative.” Brickner, who is a former Valparaiso Police chief, has often espoused the need for non-monetary compensation to boost morale.
“I’ve heard that a lot from you over the years,” Balon replied. He said that’s why he has annual sit-downs with his employees. But he would like to offer more, from a $500 physical fitness allowance, similar to what he offered Valparaiso Police when he was their chief in his last post, to education and veteran stipends.
Balon and his fiscal staff run two separate budgets, one for the Sheriff’s Department and one for the jail. For the Sheriff’s Department, they are requesting just over $700,000 more in the General Fund than this year, as well as additional increases in eight other funds for a total of $924,885 more than 2025.
There are decreases of just over $1 million to another eight funds, but it is too simplistic to subtract one from the other to get a net reduction or addition to the 2026 budget as the future of several grants is uncertain. “The council can’t decide how to handle expenses if we don’t know revenue,” Martin said.
The jail budget for 2026 has $117,000 in increases to four funds and $744,000 in decreases to three others, including the ending of the $300,000 Adult Community Corrections Grant that was cut by the state for 2026. That grant was used in part to pay the salaries and benefits of two case managers at the jail and that money will now need to come out of the General Fund.
Half of it was used to contract with NorthShore Health Center to provide services to inmates for mental health, chemical dependency and more. Balon said NorthShore is attempting to find a grant to cover that contract amount.
Council Vice President Red Stone, R-1st, again brought up the possibility of improving revenue for the Sheriff’s Office by charging inmates at the Porter County Jail. “If our own community, parents of a juvenile” have to pay $110 per day when their children are incarcerated, “why don’t we charge for an adult?,” he asked. “As a taxpayer, I don’t think I should be paying for these people.”
The final budget workshop is Thursday at 3:30 p.m. in the basement conference room at the Porter County Administration Building.
Shelley Jones is a freelance reporter for the Post-Tribune.