by the house, and then the personnel funds. So, uh first I would like to say thank you for coming. You didn't have to spend your afternoon here, and we know that. But, we appreciate your engagement with the Sheriff's Office and the community to ensure that we are working together and and keeping our community safe. So, uh there are a number of people from the Sheriff's Office in the back uh that uh um interact with the team that delivers the service every day with them and leads them. So, I'll introduce them as questions may come up. So, what I like to do, if it's okay with everyone, is we'll go through and kind of give you an update. And then, any questions, if you're just kind of hold them until the end, and then we'll be glad to take any questions. For those that may be online listening to us, if you have questions, just send the questions on social media, and we're monitoring that, and at the end my team will let me know what your questions are from online, and I'll answer them. So, and here at your tables, I see some of you are looking at is our 2025 annual report. And so, I'm not going to go into all those details because they're here. But, I think Joseph, have we posted the annual report on our website? So, for those online can look for the 2025 annual report. By the way, that was paid for by your local drug dealers. The printing. So, so we try to take their revenue from their illicit drug trade and turn it into something productive for the community. And in the back, there's I think some jar openers back there the drug dealers also paid for, and maybe some other things. So, be sure to get that on your way back or on your way out. So, we'll go ahead and get started. And obviously, welcome to the Sheriff's Office. This is our ninth year doing addressing crime together. I believe that engaged community, informed community is a safer community. And we use guardianship policing in our agency, which is a hybrid of community policing. And guardianship really requires the guardians of the community, which is all of us, working together. So, you might be the guardian of your street, maybe your community, maybe your neighborhood, neighborhood watch, or a business community. We all need to work together, and so cuz we are all truly guardians of our community. And so, that's the kind of policing that we use here. I sum it up this way. >> [clears throat] >> We police with the community. We don't police the community. So, just by changing two words, it's a completely different style of policing. Okay? So, we'll go ahead and get started. So, in case you're not familiar with the Sheriff's Office, you know, since I was elected sheriff in 2016, 45,000 new residents have moved into Flagler County. And so, so we have a lot of new people that maybe don't realize what the Sheriff's Office does, especially if you're a northern Sheriff's Office, cuz they're very different than a southern Sheriff's Office. So, we are the largest and only full-service law enforcement agency in Flagler County. And by full service, it's because we operate the jail by law. We operate all the court services, but also anything that comes out of the court from the judges, we have to handle that, plus the protection of the judges, if you will. And then we have your more traditional policing, which is your law enforcement side. So, and we have many of the functions that the two smaller police departments do not have, such as undercover operations, our homeland security section, real-time crime center, things like that. And our team supports the two smaller police departments when they need help. We provide all the police services for the city of Palm Coast, the town of Beverly Beach, town of Marineland, as well as all unincorporated areas of the county. We are the primary, and in some cases, the only law enforcement agency that they have. We do let the city Bunnell Police Department and Flagler Beach Police Department handle their call calls for service as the primary, and if they need us, then we support them depending on what they have. We provide all the court and detention services. You know, in the jail, the official name of the jail is the Sheriff Perry Hall Inmate Detention Facility. I had nicknamed it the Green Roof Inn when I during my speech of being sworn in as sheriff, and it when I was writing that that speech about, you know, we're going to put criminals in the Green Roof Inn, and it just kind of popped in there, and I said it, and it kind of stuck. And so, it's more commonly known in the community as the Green Roof Inn. And the current capacity of the jail is 454 inmates. We're averaging around 200 inmates a night for criminal activity. We've been as high as 330. When I became sheriff, the average daily population of jail was 128. And now, I'll give you a little comparison. So, we have we're about 100 and 40, 45,000 population in the county. Putnam County is about 80,000 population. Their jail averages around 700 a night. Okay? So, we're double their size, lot less, and we have a very low crime rate. So, number of reasons for that, and you'll hear about some of that as we go along. We have about 375 full-time members of the Sheriff's Office, and almost 100 volunteers on top of that. Those are the ones that drive around mostly in the COP cars. And but they also volunteer on our marine unit, bicycles, in the courthouse, operating here, help us operate our district office, and things like that. So, we really could not survive without our volunteers, and provide those extra services like vacation watch when you go on vacation, VIN verifications, things like that. So, they just do an amazing job. We're always looking for more. So, you can always go to joinflaglersheriff.com, and if you want to volunteer, and click on the volunteer. So, our mission is supporting a safe community through distinguished service. Our vision is to be nationally recognized for excellence and innovative public safety services and community partnerships. And then, we do this through our areas of focus. Workforce excellence, technology maximization, positive community outcomes, and operational excellence. And let me say, I didn't create this. And the leadership did not create it. This was a bottom-up. We asked for the team that's delivering these services every day to you to come up with our mission statement, areas of focus, and our vision. They also came up with our core values, and I was very impressed, and this is proof that I didn't do this cuz I'm not this creative. They came up with our core values that spells trust. And so, transparency is really the fundamental key to unlocking partnerships with our citizen. And that's a double-edged sword, quite frankly, because we're very transparent. If we screw something up, we're going to tell you this is what what happened. This is what we did to fix it so it doesn't happen again. Fortunately, that didn't happen too often, but once in a while it does. But, we also tell you what crime we're seeing. That's one of the reasons why we have the addressing crime together meetings. But then, the perception can be that crime is up because we tell you about it. When in reality, statistically, crime is down over 54%. I'm going to show you a couple graphs on that. But, we do have some opportunities, challenges that we're seeing so far in 2026 that that we're going to talk about. But, I believe in transparency because I believe an informed community is a safer community. The responsibility. It's our responsibility to uphold our profession. And I will tell you, I've been doing this a long, long time. I've worked for in my career, five sheriffs before I was a sheriff, and I worked for two police chiefs early in my career. And I can tell you that the tone of an agency and the culture of an agency starts at the top. And so, it has to start with me, and follow all the way down for us to keep our responsibility. United. We're united with the community. That's why we have meetings like this. That's why we engage the community because we need you as a partner in there. Our strength is only measured by 100% effort, and I can you know, I don't ask my people to work any harder than I do. And they have a hard time keeping up with me. Cuz I try to set the tone. Uh my average day is probably 12 to 14 hours a day. And fortunately I have a very patient wife. And uh uh but uh I think it's important to uh lead the way. And so I still go out on patrol. I pull people over. Sometimes they get tickets from me. Sometimes I'm I'm more lenient than I write tickets, but there are times that people uh do get a ticket from the sheriff. Uh I think the first six tickets I wrote as sheriff, every one of those people took me to trial. Uh I won every one of them, but it was like really? But uh but anyways, and then teamwork uh is the foundation of our success. Uh you have a five-diamond accredited law enforcement agency, and I want to put that in perspective. So there's about 19,000 law enforcement agencies across the country. There's about uh I think three, 400 three 350 I think of in Florida. There's 67 sheriffs in Florida for the counties, and then the rest are city police departments. Most agencies across the country and in Florida do not even have one accreditation. Your agency has five. So we are accredited in law enforcement, which means that we maintain the highest standards uh in acceptable professional law enforcement. In fact, I served on the law enforcement accreditation commission for 6 years until I was termed off. That's the most you can serve. And I served as chairman uh one year. While I was on the commission, we revoked the Broward County Sheriff's Office accreditation. So that's how serious we take the accreditation process and in Florida and on the commission. Uh the detention facility is accredited. Uh same high standards uh and very few detention centers in the state of Florida are accredited. Uh but yours is. Uh the telecommunication center is accredited. Now the telecommunications was a recent change, October 1. So the county had operated or owned the radio system, the building, the 911 non-emergency phone lines, um and the CAD system, computer computer-aided dispatch system. The only thing they didn't have was the people. And the people were Sheriff's Office employees. And after the Stoneman Douglas tragedy in Broward County, which is where uh on February 14th, uh a gunman went in, former student, killed a bunch of high school students, the Stoneman Douglas Commission looked at that and made a bunch of recommendations. And one of their recommendations was that only one entity should be responsible be responsible for public safety answering points, which is known as PSAP, when the 911 calls came in. Because what was happening in that incident, radio communication did not work between the Sheriff's Office down there and multiple different police departments. They couldn't communicate. The 911 call, depending on where the tower was, would go to different PSAPs. And so it was complete chaos. So after that, they made this recommendation. And so I got to looking at it last year like, you know, really the county has everything uh it's a gold-plated system that we had cuz they they were already accredited. And the training center for communication, 911 communications, was also accredited. So we transferred uh those employees over to the county. So now in Flagler County, there is one entity responsible for everything. So that if there's a CAD system issue now, you call the county. Uh if the 911 system goes down, again, it's the county instead of us being in the middle of it. So you guys probably didn't even know that occurred cuz it was done seamless. And they're doing a great job. I stopped in there yesterday. So uh but they are accredited. National Institute of Ethics has accredited this agency. And then the medical services in uh the jail, which we're required to provide since we have custody of them, is also now accredited. So uh there are five you know, this agency has five accreditations. Now we could keep going, but there's a cost to doing that, too, cuz you have it's not just fill out the paperwork. You have to prove uh that that you are maintaining it. That's the hard part. You can get accredited pretty easy. It's proving that you are maintaining it. That's how we revoked the Broward County uh Sheriff's Office accreditation. Now they have since earned it back, but that was all over the Stoneman Douglas uh incident. So in your book, you'll find this page actually. Uh just kind of tell you how busy we are. I won't go through all of these, but we did uh you know, our number one quality of life complaint uh is traffic. And it's only gotten worse. Okay? So just let you know, we stopped 27,000 vehicles last year. Okay? Uh out of that, we wrote 6,800 tickets. Now, here's what I tell my deputies. They have discretion on whether or not they write a ticket, a real ticket, which is what's counted here, a warning, uh or a written or verbal warning. That's strictly up to them. Uh but I want them to work traffic because it is our number one quality of complaint uh issue. And uh but more importantly, it's part of how we reduce crime in this county. Because criminals mostly don't walk. They like to go from point A to point B, either to commit the crime or leave it. And they commit traffic violations. And if you work traffic, you might find the evidence of what they just did. Uh maybe they're them or someone in the car is a fugitive. So lots of things like that. And there's proven studies by the federal government, uh National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, proving that if you work traffic, it has a positive impact on reducing crime. So um we took 151 kids shopping uh last December. Uh many of you may have supported that through your contributions to uh Flagler Sheriff's Children's Charities. So we thank you for that. Uh each kid got $200 to go shopping. We picked them up. They started in the parking lot here with some interaction with the deputies, throwing uh Florida's equivalent of uh snowballs, um which is really just big cotton balls, okay? Um to face painting to you name it. And then we took them shopping uh in Walmart. Great partnership by Walmart. Uh we made a little over 3,000 arrests last year. And uh I see we need to up update our slide here. We missed that. Instead of 400, we now have 454 beds in the jail. And uh but anyways, I won't go through all of this, but um you can see it in in the annual report. Um the City of Palm Coast did a survey. 92% of the residents felt safe in Palm Coast. Uh they like our uh services by 82%. They felt our services were good or excellent. Which frankly means that we can improve. Uh you know, we should be as close to 100% as we can. Uh may never get there, but that should be our goal. Uh 76% rated uh crime prevention in the City of Palm Coast either good or excellent. Again, we have some room for improvement. 81% felt safe uh from property crime. And 79% felt safe from violent crime. Now this goes back to because we tell you what violent crime we do have, it makes everybody think there's more crime. In reality, we are the safest county in the four-county area. And it's rare that we have violent crime. But I am going to talk about some violent crime that we do have. Um and and this is, you know, just uh it's not these are not studies that we do, okay? These are studies that have been done and we find out about them. So uh Palm Coast, second best city uh in Florida to move to out of 30. Um And recently it was ranked uh Palm Coast was ranked uh number one out of the eight best cities to retire to. Okay? Uh we're ranked the 15th safest city in Florida, uh only behind the Villages. Uh Palm Coast ranked uh second. And then 39th safest uh Palm Coast ranked 39th safest town in America. Okay? So I uh I I really commend our team and our community for working together uh with us to deliver for the community. Uh I did miss one. We were given an overall crime grade of uh A. And actually violent crime we got A+. So uh this is not because we have a lot of violent crimes, cuz we don't have violent crime. Okay? And there. Uh so in 2025, here's what it looks like. So, in 24, in 25. So, what happened was, if you look at the Let me start with the one on the right. The old way the federal government required us to report crime was known as uniform crime reporting system. And it It was a statistic and they defined There's definitions that we have to follow and we're required by law to report uh our crime. So, you can see in 2017, it was my first year as sheriff. We went down every year through uh 2023. Then the federal government decided to change the calculation and definition. So, we can't compare 2023 to 2024 and 25. So, but the slide the bar chart on your left uh is a comparison of the new definitions and the new reporting requirements for 24 and 25. And last year compared to 24, crime dropped another 30%. And um but it's a completely re-different calculation. So, we dropped a total of about 54% uh since uh 2017 to 2023. And how do we do that? Well, we do things, you know, we know that drugs fuel a lot of crime and so we'll do things like operation slammer. Uh this was some of the individuals that got caught in that. Uh and most of them are serving various uh prison sentences now. This is some of the drugs that were recovered in operation slammer, the cash which helped pay for these books and things like that. Uh but I will tell you that wherever you find drugs, you're going to find guns and other weapons. And wherever there's marijuana, there's always other drugs associated with it. So, it's just uh a fact of life of what we find. Uh this is again operation summer slammer when we were doing the roundup. And uh you can you can tell you probably don't really want them to be your neighbors. in there. But, uh in our court and detention services, I I Well, I'm a law and order sheriff. If we can help somebody turn their life around to become a productive citizen, that's my preference. And so, uh we have all kinds of programs in the jail. We have partnerships from in the community, churches, uh businesses, uh and with uh Flagler Technical College that we can provide them the opportunity to turn their life around. So, we have an inmate work crew that saves taxpayers about $100,000 or so a year uh where they are maintaining the grounds of public buildings. Um They can't do your property, so I apologize in advance. It's against the law. Otherwise, I live on six acres, they would be at my house if if we could do that, but we can't. But, we have a fatherhood program that's called inside out dad. Uh we know that generational uh you know, grandpa's in jail and dad goes in jail and likely the kids are going to follow uh that same model, if you will. And so, uh we have a program in the jail to teach dads that are in the jail the impact that they're having on their children and do you really want your children to follow your footsteps? And here is how you can be a dad even while you're in jail, but especially when you get out of jail. So, uh that's one of the programs that we have in there. We also know that most inmates in a county jail are going to go back into the community. We arrest about uh not quite 300, about 275 uh a month. Most of those people back in the community for different things. Now, some are going to stay in jail, some are going to go to a state prison facility, some are going to be sentenced to county jail time. Um and county jail time is defined as this, 364 days or less. At 365 days, 1 year, you go to state, okay? Uh but we know that they're going to be back in our community cuz most of our offenders are low-level property crime, drugs for the most part. And so, let's see if we can make them productive so they don't come back. And so, that's part of our uh homeward bound program so they get skills. We have an HVAC and electric electrical apprentice program. Um we even have uh a culinary program in the jail in partnership with one of our restaurants. And uh they send their executive chef over and the inmates uh learn how to be a good cook, if you will. And when they leave the jail, they actually leave with a state of Florida uh restaurant manager's license. And every restaurant that's open, whenever they're open, anybody that works there has to be under the guidance of one of these licensed managers. And so, uh they can leave there and be productive is the point. Um Uh some of our partnerships get them uh their birth certificates, replacement social security cards cuz they need that stuff to be lawfully employed in in uh Florida. And most of them have lost it, so uh they work uh to get them. So, it's a great partnership uh with uh the community to deliver this. Uh mentioned the homeward bound stuff, I think I've pretty well covered all of that. All your patrol cars you see driving around marked, all those decals were uh apprenticed and applied by an inmate. And they can leave there the jail with a graphic artist certificate uh from Flagler Technical College, so uh and it's not only does it save you as a taxpayer money, cuz all the equipment was bought uh from funds called inmate welfare funds, uh which is not tax dollars in there. The jail is accredited. Uh it's won multiple awards uh from the American Jail Association and a few others uh for what we're doing in the jail uh using technology to help inmates turn their lives around or the programs that we offer. In fact, um my uh division chief of the jail and myself just uh back in January presented to the National Sheriff's Association in Washington, D.C. where where not every sheriff in America comes, but a big significant portion do on the programs that we have in the jail. in there. So, let's talk about some future challenges uh that we're seeing for 2026 because that's really what we're talking about, right? Uh addressing crime together. Um so, let me just tell you uh quickly before we get into that is uh we are currently the sixth fastest growing county in the state of Florida. Uh 2 years ago, we were the third, so we've slowed down a little bit, but we're still very fast out of 67 uh counties. Our inmate population, I already mentioned that it's running about 200. Uh the county population today is estimated 146,800. By 2030, so we're just uh 4 years away from that. Uh it's 158,000 projected. And look at this, 2035, so we're talking what, about seven Well, about eight years uh from now, 172,000. Which means the growth is going to come. And uh it's because we have a beautiful community, uh our beaches and so forth. Uh and we want to keep it that way. And so, that's why we do our best to keep our little bubble here. What What goes on around us doesn't really matter to me as long as it doesn't affect Flagler. So, here's some of the challenges. We can't drive. Uh quite frankly, you know that. You probably knew that coming here. Um but uh our total crashes were up in 2025, that's the red line uh ball line that you see, and our injuries were up. And so, uh we do a lot of things to try to reduce crashes and we're going to continue to do that. Uh we work with our partners, the Bunnell Flagler Beach Police Departments, Highway Patrol. Uh and we do traffic uh enforcement. This is called operation crash, collision reduction and safe highways. Uh you may have seen our sheriff taxi out there cuz my belief is, you know, we cannot enforce our way out of the traffic problem. So, if you look at a three-legged stool, you have to have all three legs on this stool for it to stand. So, if you look at that, just visualize that, you have to do enforcement, you have to do education, and you have to engineer the roads. So, we can do the enforcement, we can do a lot of the education, but we're not responsible for the engineering. know, we can make recommendations and I'll give you a prime example. Look at State Road 100 today. Okay, I remember when my wife and I moved here 20 years ago. We came out of Orlando. Okay. And we would hear somebody say ah, traffic's so bad. I had to wait one traffic light to get across Palm Coast Parkway and get across 95. Now, they forgot they came from New York and New Jersey and you know, other very congested areas and we would laugh. Okay, my wife and I would. Well, today we have traffic congestion. We have rush hour that we never used to have before. So, this is where the engineering comes in. Uh and better communication probably uh especially with the state level DOT. It takes about 10 years for a Florida Department of Transportation project to start in the pipeline and get built between all the engineering and everything that has to be done, funding by the legislature and so forth. So, about 10 years. So, if you recall, less than a year ago State of Florida on State Road 100 cuz they're responsible for it, repaved it. They added and extended a few turn lanes. What really needed to happen, six lanes on each side. I'm sorry, three lanes on each side, six total plus some turn lanes. That didn't occur because the pipeline 10 years before said it needed repaving and it needed this. And look at all the growth that's come in there. Uh you got BJ's down and all the restaurants that have come in and you're soon to have another Walmart from what I hear uh coming in uh and it's already congested. So, we we can make recommendations, but it's a long term to fix the engineering side of that three-legged stool. Okay. Uh so, we're going to educate. That's like the taxi saying, don't drink and drive cuz the taxi or the Uber's a lot cheaper than the backside of that car uh going to jail, having an attorney, paying all these fines and that's if you don't hurt somebody cuz you're driving drunk. Okay. Um the traffic unit has been increased 210% since I've been sheriff. Uh when I was elected, we have five motorcycles dedicated to traffic and that's it. And it's been it was like that way for a decade or two. Uh we now have eight motorcycles and we have eight Mustangs that are dedicated to uh traffic enforcement. Every patrol car now that's marked and some unmarked cars have radar. Every deputy has been trained cuz it's a required 40-hour um class that they have to take to be able to testify in court that they or knew how to use the radar. That really changed because there was no training when I started my career. You just had a tuning fork, you used it, made sure that it it picked up the right speed based on which tuning fork you're using and you pointed the radar at somebody. Now, it's a whole 40-hour class. And so, every deputy's been trained for that. So, the tools tools are there, but again we can't enforce a way out of this problem. It takes everybody and the biggest increase we have on traffic crashes is distracted driving. Okay. Uh so, to try to educate our teen drivers, we do teen driver challenge. It's a partnership with the Florida Sheriff's Association. So, uh if you have a qualifying teenage uh driver uh and you would like them to go through this class, it's our traffic unit that puts that on and they instruct it and they actually get to uh educate them and then they get to drive on a course that that we set up. And uh the next one is in May. Uh May 22nd, 6:00 to 8:00 p.m. is the classroom portion and then the driving portion is May 23rd from 8:00 to 5:00 p.m. So, if you have somebody that that uh you would like to uh attend that class, uh you can go to uh flaglersheriff.com, look for public interest teen driver challenge and sign up your your uh uh teenage uh driver uh cuz we want to educate them what what to do and the dangers of driving impaired also is part of that. So, current trends. Well, our fraud [clears throat] cases are up uh 124 reported in the first uh 3 months of this year. And when I talk fraud, most of that is scams. That's uh the stuff that comes in on the internet, on your phone, phone calls and they convince you that you have a warrant for your arrest but you need to pay us in crypto or gift cards and we won't arrest you. I promise you that's not how we operate. Uh but people do fall for that. Uh or you ran a toll. How many in here uh got a text or an email that said you owed $6.95 for running a toll booth? Anybody in here? I know I got it and they almost convinced me. Cuz I had ironically been in a meeting in Miami and my car had SunPass on it and I get this email and it's like, oh, I was just down in Miami. Just did my SunPass not work? But I knew the clue when I read it because it said in that letter is that we can't send you a photo of your uh vehicle running the toll until you pay us. Well, that's not the way it works. There's always a photo of your vehicle and usually of you as a driver uh when that happens. So, but I knew that most people didn't. So, they made millions of dollars just on that scam alone. And uh so, we see that, we offer uh classes on it. We just had one yesterday in Grand Haven uh scams and frauds. So, if you're interested, uh look on our website uh because we will give you the skills to try to protect yourself cuz these scammers are very, very convincing. Uh we've had we've had one victim here uh that lost a million dollars. Okay. We've had a few that have lost hundreds of thousands of dollars. Most of them are somewhere 25,000 or less. Um I just wrote uh I was very active with the Sheriff's Association and some of our legislature to pass a crypto ATM uh bill. It's been sent to the governor to sign. Cuz you know, when you go to an ATM, a bank ATM to get cash you have limitations on what how much money you can take a day. There's nothing on the crypto ATM that controls it. So, these scammers convince you uh for what it whatever scam they're using cuz they have different variations to go get your money go to a crypto ATM that's usually at a convenience store, smoke shop, one of those places and send it to them. Okay. And so, I just signed a letter today uh asking the governor to not veto it and make sure you sign it uh as a sheriff because in this county alone since we have been tracking crypto ATM, which has only been a few years 2.7 million in losses. Okay. And um the bill that was being worked on was worked on uh for a couple years uh before it could get through the legislative process because there was a lot of resistance by the people that own the ATM or the crypto ATMs because they're charging 35 and 40% fee for converting it. And so, um hopefully the governor will sign it and it will give us another tool to protect our community because that's is a big problem right now. And the problem is, once you realize that you have become a victim if you're embarrassed and don't report it right away it makes it much harder for us to recover that money because we need to know what wallet you put it in what and then we've got to try to get it before they move that money from that wallet to another wallet, which it goes to another wallet to another wallet and bury it. And my fastest growing unit in the Sheriff's Office right now in my investigative services section is our cybercrimes unit. And we have the capability uh with software and and and a really great team uh to uh recover this money if you report it to us right away. The longer it's delayed, the harder it is for us to monitor it because we can't we can't try to seize that money until it's starting to get moved out of that wallet that we know you put it in. And so, it's very tech technical. We have software that monitors it for us and lets us know when it's being moved and then we have to get court orders to seize it. And so, it's not fast, but we have been able to recover money, but the best prevention is sitting in this room or listening to us online and knowing how to protect yourself to not fall for these scammers cuz they are very, very convincing in there. Uh construction burglaries. So, in my day early on, it was never a burglary, a house under construction, it was a theft. But now under the law and the new definition, it's technically a burglary. And we have a lot of homes being built. And so even without windows and doors, if it's inside that court of curtilage area, then it's a burglary. And so we are having some of those. And but and I'm going to jump to auto theft and I'll come back to the other two. So, auto theft, we've had eight autos reported stolen so far this year. Uh let me give you some suggestion on how you can prevent it. If you loan your car to somebody, make sure you really know that person and they're really going to bring it back. Because that's what most of our auto thefts have been. It's people loaning a car to an alleged friend and the friend keeps your car or doesn't return it. Yeah, we've we've kind of gone from leaving the keys in the car, which used to be a problem a few years ago, uh to now loaning the car out. So, um unless you really know that person really well, just don't loan your car out. Then you don't have to worry about it, okay? Uh but always remember to keep your car doors locked. Always remember to never leave your keys in the car. Don't Those are all crimes of opportunity and we can prevent crime if you just do some crime prevention yourself. Um the biggest issue that we're seeing so far this year is domestic violence. And and then violation of injunctions. The violations injunctions are usually tied to domestic violence. Uh so you get arrested for domestic violence, judge as a condition of your release from the jail says you cannot have any contact uh with the victim. But then you do. That's a violation. Judges don't really care for that. It'll cause you to get rearrested and have to go back through the jail process and see the judge again. Um So, the violation of injunctions is a big key, but domestic violence itself and it's likely even though even though we've had 154 cases reported for the first 3 months of this year, chances are that's not all the domestic violence that's occurred. A lot of domestic violence is not reported. We have a zero tolerance policy. So, if we can prove probable cause when deputies on the scene who the primary aggressor is, that person is going to get arrested. Uh because we also use it to prevent a more serious crime uh by diffusing that situation. And so and then we also have a behavioral response unit. Our victim advocates will try to work with the victim uh to break that cycle. But a lot of times they don't want a victim doesn't want to report it. And the majority of the victims are female, although there are some that uh um you know, are female, but clearly the majority that we arrest are males. Um But >> [clears throat] >> we need to break that cycle because often it can end in a a fatality if it continues to spiral out of control in there. So, we're seeing that trend of the domestic violence and the fraud cases are really the two biggest things that we're seeing uh this year so far. Uh so, you can help reduce opportunistic crime. Uh lock up your vehicles, take your keys and key fobs, remove your valuables from plain view. Uh we see video all the time from homeowners where people are uh their security cameras at their home picks up people 2 3 4:00 in the morning uh going through and pulling on car doors. And if they find one unlocked, then they're going to look around inside it. If it's locked, they're going to move to your neighbor. And if they lock their door, they're going to just keep going and hopefully get them all the way to St. Johns County or Putnam or Volusia, okay? Um and garage doors, keep them closed even when you're home uh cuz all of those can be crimes of opportunity. You don't know who's driving by and just looking in and say, "Oh, I I want that lawnmower. I want that bicycle or whatever's in your garage." Uh and then be observant of construction sites in your neighborhood. We really need your help. If you see something suspicious in these construction areas that are you know, cuz they're popping up everywhere, uh give us a call. We would much rather come and check it out and find out everything is fine uh than uh have to investigate the crime afterwards and then we start knocking on doors and talking to people and say, "You know, I saw this pickup truck at at 7:00 at night backed in at this this house, but I really didn't think anything about it." We'd rather check that out. So, call us for that. So, I want to talk to you about a couple other things that are going to come online this year. Uh so, through a public-private partnership, uh this helicopter was donated about 800,000 value by the owner to our citizens. The taxpayers paid 575,000, drug dealers paid 125,000. Uh we think it'll be operational for late 20 July 2025. Now, let me explain why this is important. Um So, we use drones and I'm going to talk about some drones in a minute. Um but there are times that you really need a helicopter, okay? So, we're going to use what makes the most financial sense for the situation. We can use a drone, that's what we're going to use. If we need the helicopter, we're going to use the helicopter. Now, Fireflight uh County Fire Department has a helicopter. It goes off duty at 8:00 p.m. So, there was no coverage after 8:00 p.m. for anything. Um this helicopter is being equipped for Medevac and law enforcement. Uh so, we have will have the capability for Medevac after 8:00 p.m. Now, we don't control if the fire department on duty on scene paramedic uses us. We can only make it available because the paramedic on scene makes that decision. So, uh the other thing that we have had occur is that because Fireflight's primary mission is firefighting with Medevac. Firefighting being their top uh priority from the fires that occurred in Flagler County before I lived here and probably many of you lived here. Um So, what they did for the most part is they have taken off the law enforcement equipment on the aircraft. So, the the floor or forward-looking infrared system they took off. The spotlight they took off. Those are the two things that we need the most in law enforcement. And uh they said, "Well, we can put it back on, but it'll take 25 to 30 minutes." Okay. But what you don't understand is when we need a helicopter, we actually probably needed it 5 minutes before we called you. So, we can't wait another 20 or 30 minutes. So, the goal with this helicopter it's a 2018, it only had 535 hours on it. Business owner wasn't using it anymore. And and frankly, I tried to get him to donate 100% of it, but I couldn't get him quite there. Uh but he did a great job. I mean, it's valued at 1.5 million. Um And and you as a taxpayer paid 575,000 for it. And um uh we're going to try to not overlap Fireflight hours so that we are available when Fireflight is not. But that will frankly depend on if they are keeping the law enforcement gear on it. Uh cuz if they're not, then that doesn't make sense. So, we'll we'll see uh what we will do there to you know, efficiently operate the um this helicopter and Fireflight uh together. But it's being it's already painted uh like you see it and uh the law enforcement gear is being installed now. And so we think by the end of July, it'll be functional. Um The two pilots and the two tactical flight officers were already in the budget. In fact, they have been for the last 2 years. I just didn't fill them um because I was hoping to have this thing done like a couple years ago uh through the full donation, but it just took longer than I thought. And so no additional cost for uh funding it or operating it cuz I already had it in the budget. And uh and there's no payment to it cuz we paid uh cash for uh the helicopters. So, uh I think it's a good deal um for us and it'll last for decades to come. I mentioned drones. we are in the process of implementing drone as a first responder. So, we have drones currently that are portable drones that uh licensed uh pilots cuz in law enforcement uh in government, we have to be licensed by the FAA to fly a drone. You as a private citizen can fly a drone without a license for the most part. We cannot. So, we have about uh five drones right now that are portable. We have licensed pilots, and that's collateral duty. So, one of your deputies that you see driving around in a patrol car answering calls, he may actually have a drone in his in the back of his SUV, and he's licensed so that when he's needed they can uh you know, divert to that. Okay? What we are about to uh roll out uh it's in the final stages of being installed right now, and I see some of the city of Palm Coast folks in the back. So, I want to thank uh uh the city for partnering with us uh on this uh because uh well, I'm not going to give exact locations of where they're at. Let me just say we have one north and one south in the city of Palm Coast. But, what will occur is when it's fully functional, these are like garages, if you will. Uh and from our real-time crime center that is here in this building up on the second floor, our analysts will actually be able to launch one of these drones and fly it to where the call is uh remotely. And we just had had actually uh a premature uh deployment, if you will, where we used it, and um uh the drone got there before the first deputy on the scene was beaming back, if you will, uh video of what exactly was going on into our real-time crime center, and that was being uh relayed to the deputies as they were responding. So, it it's be a great addition. It won't replace a helicopter uh cuz there are times that you need a helicopter. But, we will use our drones when we don't need the cost of a helicopter in there. So, we will have a blended approach. There are sometimes, you know, one of the downsides to a drone, they're very quiet. Sometimes you need the noise of a helicopter to keep people hunkered down, the criminals, so that they think we can't see them. So, they stay put, but yet our floor system in the helicopter spots them, and we direct the canine or the deputies in. So, it just depends on the situation of the call. Uh but we will be one of the the first agencies in the state of Florida, and frankly across the country, that has drones as a first responder, as it's called. So, drug dealers just bought us this Jeep. We appreciate that. Uh this is a Jeep Gladiator, and it's going to be as part of our special operations uh unit, and I wanted something that looked uh bad, and I'll let you finish the last of it. Um so, here is what we're going to do with this. Uh we have some big surplus military vehicles that we use for high water rescue. Uh and they're getting very old, and they're big and bulky. They're Anybody in military, they're deuce and a halves. Uh you'll know what that means. So, um but they serve the purpose. But, sometimes we don't need that big of a vehicle to do high water rescue because of the storms that we get, whether it's hurricanes or tropical storms. So, this will now be able to go into areas uh like the Mondex when it's flooded out and rescue people or deliver uh bottle water or food rations. Same thing on the barrier island side. It's also going to be used um up in a in area of Flagler County that's known as Flagler Estates. And that's a very remote area of the county. It's on the northwest part of the county. It borders uh mostly St. Johns County, where they have a developed side of Flagler Estates. Ours is pretty much undeveloped with dirt roads. Uh and then it also borders part of Putnam County. And the only way we can get to it is actually go into St. Johns County and come back down. The problem for us is that the criminal element have dis- has discovered it. And so, they go out there with ATVs, and they basically just raise hell up there. And they shoot at the FPL power lines trying to shoot them down, I guess. I don't know. We've had burned cars that were stolen dumped up there. On the St. Johns County side, they found a body in one of their burned cars. Uh that So, it's really in you know, like the wild west or area of uh Flagler County. And even our SUVs, if it's been raining, get stuck in there. And so, it's very difficult for us to patrol it. Well, we're going to show them pretty soon that no one's going to think, if they see this Jeep coming to it, "Oh, it's somebody here to play with us." until we turn on the lights. And then it'll light up like a Christmas tree. And we're not going to get stuck uh with you know, out there uh with this vehicle. If we do get stuck, then our driver doesn't know how to drive it. Okay? It sits 30 in off the ground. Okay? So, so, that is uh coming. We'll also use it for community engagement, like touch a truck. Uh the city of Palm Coast does a touch a truck, so we'll unveil it there for the first time. And when it's at those community engagements, you need to stop by, especially if you own a Jeep, because we have little ducks. Cuz you know, that's a big thing with Jeeps. So, the drug dealers paid for those, by the way, too. The little ducks. Looks like a little sheriff, but a duck. And and get your collector uh duck. But, we thank the uh drug dealers for paying for that. You can see slightly it's called what we call a ghost marking on the side. Now, when it at night, when the when headlights or something, it shines up like anything, like you see some of our ghost chargers that drive around. But, um I will tell you I unveiled it at a community event with Nassau County Sheriff's Office couple weekends ago. We had just got it. And I went up there, quite frankly, just to harass my friend, the sheriff up there in Nassau County. And as soon as I pulled in, there was about uh I don't know, 150 Jeeps up there. Everybody wanted to come look at this Jeep. Okay? So, it's going to be great for community engagement, also. Um Lots of opportunities to volunteer. I mentioned our citizens on patrol. Our Police Athletic League is always looking for volunteers. If you're interested in helping our youth out there, you know, we moved our Police Athletic League operation to the Carver gym in South Bunnell. And before that, if we had 100 kids in the program, uh that was a lot. Now, if you look at all the programs that we're offering now that we're at where the kids where it's needed, and since we're there, uh we're averaging about 900 kids now in that program. So, if you it's one of those things, if you take it to where they need it, uh they will use it. So, we have boxing, and we have volleyball, you name it. Uh we have it there, and that's in a partnership with Flagler County, City of Bunnell, and the school district uh allows us for that. We also have a mounted posse. So, if you have a horse and you want to come join our posse, let us know. Um we support you, but we let you pay for the horse. We let you shovel it and and take care of it, but we will support the rest of it. Um some other things that we do, um uh attend or join our Sheriff's Citizens Academy. It's hosted here. There's one going on right now. Um but, you will really learn everything about the Sheriff's Office if you uh take a class. And it's 6 weeks long, two nights a week, and then you graduate, and you can become a member of the Sheriff's Citizen Alumni and stay engaged uh with it. So, I would really encourage you to uh attend if you're interested in in learning more about your Sheriff's Office. And if you're interested, it's it's strictly optional as part of the class. You can ride with a deputy sheriff one night and see everything that we do uh in action. Uh joining a neighborhood watch group is important. And one of things uh that we offer at we're over 3,000 classes now. Join a uh one of our women's self-defense uh classes. It's three classes. And uh it really teaches you how to defend yourself. It's focused on our females uh in the community. Uh they can be students, too, not just adults. Okay? And on class three, you get to practice what you've learned. Now, it's the only day that only time that you can legally beat up on a deputy sheriff. Okay? Uh but they're in a RedMan suit, but I will tell you that we have had deputies injured because some ladies get really involved in this and into it role-playing. But it's where you get to practice what you just taught. And the tactics that you are taught, you can use anywhere in the world. Uh wherever you travel to is the same. Okay? So, consider any of that. Uh if you're interested in any of what I just said, you can uh send an email to communityengagement@flaglersheriff.com and Commander Latsen and his team will uh hook you up. Some of our upcoming events, so we have a share a uh safety expo on August 15th from 10:00 to 2:00 p.m. at European Village. Uh we will do displays and you can interact uh with the Sheriff's Office employees. Uh we have the Summit to Protect and Serve Seniors because we know that often the seniors are purposely attacked by these scammers and other people. That will be held here on September 24th from 3:00 to 5:00 p.m. Uh we also give you free shredding at that event. So, if you've been saving up all these old tax returns and all these old documents, bring it. It won't cost you anything. Uh there'll be a truck out there and you can you can shred it at no cost. Uh our next Citizens Academy that I just mentioned is uh starts in the fall of this year. We haven't picked an exact date yet. Uh but again, communityengagement@flaglersheriff.com. I mentioned the women's self-defense. Uh the next one will be at uh Palm Coast Community Center in partnership with City of Palm Coast. Uh the next one is uh April 13th, uh then September 14th, and then uh November 16th. So, consider uh taking one of those classes. Uh we will remember our fallen heroes. We have six fallen heroes, plus sadly uh last year we had a K9 die in the line of duty. So, we're going to remember our six fallen heroes of this agency and uh the Bunnell uh fallen officer and FBI agent has connections to uh City of Palm Coast will be remembered along with all the fallen heroes across the country and our K9. And that will be on May 14th at 7:45 p.m. out in front. Uh we need it to be a little bit dark cuz we'll use some blue candles and stuff like that, but it's a very nice remembrance ceremony. Uh so, keep that in mind and if if you can can come, you're more than welcome. We're also open up uh the museum after it, so you'll be able to uh uh visit our museum. Um we're always looking for people to join our team. So, if you know somebody who's looking for a job, uh send them to us. Uh we have everything professional support to detention deputies to um law enforcement deputies, CSI, records, HR, you name it, we have it. Uh like I said, we're a full-service law enforcement agency. So, come join our team. Uh we're very competitive on on wages and benefits and uh we're always looking. So, um it's easy to uh go to look to see what we have or apply. It's joinflaglersheriff.com and to see what we have. Same thing if you want to volunteer, uh you can go there. We have been ranked uh twice as the best places to work in between Volusia and Flagler County. Stay connected with us. Facebook, X, YouTube, Instagram. Um you know, know what's going on. Sign up for our newsletter uh at sheriff just look at newsletters@flaglersheriff.com and uh sign up so that we put out a a uh monthly newsletter. So, if you're not receiving that, just go to flaglersheriff.com, find the link and and sign up. And open for questions. Anything. I'll do my best to answer. Yes, ma'am. Thank you for everything that you do. In these teams and all the warning, at the jails, is there um a way to visit any of the inmates or do you have programs for women that might be pregnant, extended with the right? Yes, so the question is is there a way to visit inmates uh at our detention facility? Yes, except it's not in person. So, we have a a detention uh visitor uh building that is next to the jail and everything is done remotely. And so, uh you do have to schedule that cuz we have to get the inmate, you know, to a visitation uh kiosk also. So, uh you can uh in effect visit them. In fact, you can actually do it from home, too, for video visitation. So, that capability uh is there. Uh we don't do the in person uh because it ensures uh contraband staying out of the jail, quite frankly. Um and it also uh is less uh if I'm not having to move inmates around all the time to meet somebody and then watch to make sure nothing's occurring, then it it's less um uh less detention deputies I need, quite frankly, which makes the jail uh a little more cost-effective. As far as programs for uh inmates that may be pregnant, um fortunately, we don't have too many of those, although we just had one. Okay? Um and so, um we do have programs that works in partnership with some of our outside partners in there. So, uh we just did an interesting thing um I guess we started about a year ago. Uh our jail went to the cats. >> [snorts] >> Instead of going to the dogs, it went to cats. So, we had a partnership with the Flagler um I guess yeah, Flagler Humane Society. And we took kittens that were newborns that they needed intensive care and we let them be part of the uh jail one of our programs there where the inmates were learning to not be so self-centered. That now they had to take care of these little kittens and feed them and so forth cuz you know, a lot of people that are drug addicted, they um they're self-centered, quite frankly. And so, this is teaching them how to be a good mom, if you will. And so, uh when they graduate from our jail, you can adopt them. And uh so, they're trained as well as I guess you can train a cat, right? So, so that's there. Other questions? Yes, sir. What happened to breakfast with a cop or something like that? So, we used to have coffee with a cop and we still offer that occasionally. What we found was no one was showing up. And so, it really wasn't uh real effective. And uh so, I you know, I probably need to talk to the your new city manager in Palm Coast cuz he's doing his meet meet the city manager. So, I'll have to see how successful that is uh for him. The Copper Loaded 9:00 a.m. Where is it? The Copper Loaded 9:00 a.m. All right. Cop. So, I guess the city manager is meeting uh people open what? 10:00 a.m.? 9:00 a.m. 9:00 a.m. at Copper Loaded? Copper Loaded Okay. I don't drink coffee, so I don't know those places, but I do come to the coffee uh with a cop. I just don't drink the coffee. So. Yes, sir. Yeah, the helicopter program, did you touch base on the operation cost? Maintenance cost of the program. And the the two officers, are they going to be officers of the two states or are they going to be one civilian? Sure. And uh then you never touched base on the budgets at all. I did a Palm Coast and uh Bunnell The Bunnell uh Beach Chief, he gave me a review of this department. He gave it on the department cost and said he walked me through everything. Yeah. He didn't give He didn't give any breakdown. Well, that wasn't what this meeting was about. So, that meeting uh actually all of that is covered in our Citizens Academy. Uh but I can give you a big overview, if you will. Okay? Cuz to get into all that, it's very detailed. Our budget's $58 million. Uh remember it provides the jail, courts, and law enforcement. As far as the operation for the uh helicopter, we estimated it $250,000 a year. Uh it will be the operation, not including personnel. Uh the personnel will be professional support. They are not going to be sworn deputies. No one is is coming off the road uh to be uh in the helicopter. They are professional support. Two pilots and two flight tactical off- or tactical flight officers. Is how and that's been in the budget uh for a few years. We just never filled the position. We have hired one pilot, the chief pilot. Uh he's a retired uh Orange County Sheriff's pilot uh with about 30 years of law enforcement uh experience. And so that's kind of it in a nutshell. Uh but I want to encourage you to uh um take our citizen academy and get all the nitty-gritty in that. Okay. Other questions? Yes, ma'am. Um the drones or the picture of the drone, is that something um that we're we'd be able to go and look at it? Or is it on display? No, they're not on display. And we're not releasing where they are because we don't want them damaged, especially, you know, the ones that are kept remotely. But if you come, and again, to the citizens academy, we actually have the drones there and we show you how they work and things like that. You also get to uh uh see our real-time crime center where the ones that I pictured here will actually be flown from remotely in there. Yep. Yes, sir. How many new deputies are you looking to hire and are you getting them from states where they're getting a little frustrated? Well, here's what I can tell you that we have had to change completely how we do our hiring. Uh you know, six years ago, if you were not already certified uh as a Florida law enforcement officer, we wouldn't even consider you. Uh not anymore. Okay. So, we do a blended thing now. Some are coming from out of state. Uh some are coming from in state. Some we're having to hire and put through the academy. That's a longer uh process. I'm actually full with a waiting list. And in some cases, over hire because we know that uh statistically, we're going to have about 12 people leave us a year. Uh well, there's retirements, career change, move, family life, what whatever. Um so, even though I'm full and I'm over hired, many of them uh are in different phases of training. So, they're not what I would say driver ready, okay, alone. So, we are in the process now of uh working on a plan to recruit and entice people uh that are already Florida certified or if they're from other states, to do what's known as an EOT, so they only have to take two weeks if they have a qualifying academy and experience from another state. Uh part of the partnership, uh we're really not a partnership. The governor uh allows us to offer $5,000 bonus from the funded by the state government for those coming from out of state. So, we do a little bit of combination of it all. Um but because we have a really good reputation uh in the law enforcement community, uh we're not like most agencies where you know, they have 50 or 60 vacancies. Uh we're very fortunate. As far as uh what we're looking for for next year, so there were two studies done, outside independent studies for staffing on this agency. And it found out when the first study was done, that we were a very underfunded, understaffed agency. And we worked with uh the city of Palm Coast and the Board of County Commissioners. And and they've been great uh better funding and staffing, authorizing the deputies. We are in next year. We're in the second year right now of a three-year plan to bring staffing up. What is supposed to happen, if everything holds, starting October 1st, there will be 13 additional deputy sheriffs. I believe that nine of those, if I remember correctly, nine or 10 are funded by the city of Palm Coast with the other three or four funded by the Board of County Commissioners. And the funding delineation is dependent uh is based on our calls for service and then the growth. And frankly, 90% of that's in the city of Palm Coast. In there. So, um and we're working on getting that list uh ready now so that October 1st is ready to go once we know it's funded. In there. Yes, ma'am. I just want to say that I got tangled up in that mess um from Paradise last week. I was very impressed with the response, how you kept the public informed, and how the negotiator was able to um handle the situation. Yeah, thank thank you very much. And in fact, when I said we kind of prematurely used our drone as a first responder, that's where the drone was. That's where it flew to. Okay. Yeah. Cuz I saw the pictures and I watched the video. Listen to the conversation between them. So, you know, I I I have to tell you that we use uh and educate and train a lot in de-escalation. Uh there are cultures in some law enforcement agencies that I don't want in this agency, okay? Um I want the I want the culture that's appropriate for this community. And one of the things that I uh tell my prospective deputies is that uh even though you have the legal right to use deadly force, it doesn't mean that's the right decision. And I'm saying that from somebody who's been shot in the line of duty. I was shot three times saving the life of a deputy. So, I get the dangers and I understand it. But if we can de-escalate, that's the better way to go. And since I have been your sheriff, we probably could have legally used deadly force 15 to 16 times. We used it once. And I couldn't have been more proud of the deputies in that incident. The guy never He was a fugitive, never gave us an opportunity to de-escalate, immediately pointed a gun uh at the deputies and we shot. And we shot him multiple times. And then the deputies uh did everything they could and in fact, helped save his life. Uh he paid a very bad price uh cuz he's paralyzed from the waist down and he's in prison for making a very bad decision. But the deputies did exactly what they were supposed to do. And once they realized he was paralyzed and they finally got him to throw the gun down, cuz he was still holding onto the gun, they immediately went in and saved his life. That's the culture and the philosophy I want in this agency. I don't want my deputies to risk themselves. But if we can tactically be safe and we can de-escalate, that's what we want to do. And you saw a great example of that with Deputy Carter uh two weeks ago. In there. So, yeah. You have a question? >> [applause] >> I have a quick question. I've noticed a lot more of the loud modified mufflers, um rubber being burned on some of our roads, and more litter in my neighborhood. I'm wondering if you could tell us a little bit about proactive policing that may um that you do now or that potentially can get more of the mufflers. So, kind of covered a couple different topics. So, here's what the law says. For us to en- en- enforce that, we have to witness it. Okay? So, first, for the loud mufflers and the burning of the rubber, uh our deputies have to witness it. And then they can pull them over and deal with it appropriately. Um my division chief, I think Chief Walkers back here in the back. Uh he has uh the responsibility of the traffic unit and all the marked uh cars. And uh he's just heard heard that. And so, he will re-emphasize that to his team. But it all depends on the availability of a deputy to witness it. The same thing, you know, because calls take the priority uh that come in. So, uh we are aware of that and we do in fact I live way out on the west side and I came came home one uh well, actually, I was going to work one morning and I saw a bunch of circles on State Road 100. And it was probably maybe 1,000 ft from the entrance to where I live. And so, I get it. Okay? And and people, you know, whoever it is, I I don't want to just say kids cuz it can be adults, too, being foolish. But they don't realize that not only are they burning up their tread on their tires, they're also damaging the roadway, which then causes it to have to be repaired or resurfaced sooner. So, yes, we are aware. As far as the littering, again, we have to see it occur uh so that we can pull them over, identify who did it. Now, there are times that if they are leaving us evidence, like their trash with their name on it from mail, then that's a different way we can handle it. But other than that, we have to actually witness it. And I know that that has been and still is an issue. I can tell you I personally have pulled people over as sheriff cuz I don't know about you, but it POs me just as much as it probably does you. Yes, ma'am. You're saying you have to witness it. Does that mean you can see it on video to witness it or you have to physically you be there to witness it? Yeah, that's a great question. So, just because you have it on video won't be enough for us to charge. We have to actually physically witness it. Now, depending on what evidence you may have there, like if there's a tag number or you identify the person, our deputies can still go knock on a door and try to contact that person. But but other otherwise to make a physical arrest or even a notice to appear or what I like to only do when I see somebody chuck out um you know, a a paper bag or a McDonald's cup or something like that, I like to pull them over and then wherever they stop, they get to walk all down there and pick it all up and take it back. That's just the way I do it. It's right right near a stop sign and they tend to throw their um um little fireball little food sample bottles. And >> And most everybody's yard in neighborhood practically where we live and swale and all. He's the one picking it up. It's a big pile there now along the tree right by the stop sign. So, at the at the end of this if you will see Chief Walker John, raise your hand. Give him the intersection that that is occurring at because if they're drinking and driving, we want to impact that too, not just the littering, okay? All right, any other questions? I know this the kids in their bikes are becoming a main issue. I saw the pictures that were posted over at Holland. Um can we do anything or can you put an unmarked car over there and let the deputy sit in the car and watch see what's going on? Yeah, so what we try to do is we try to work efficiently uh and just putting a deputy there and just have them sit, I promise you they'll never catch anything cuz it's amazing how it doesn't happen. So so what we do, I mean even in an unmarked car cuz let's face it, unmarked cars look like a police car, right? Um so what we try to do is work efficiently. So, we do the same thing with our our traffic complaints that come in. We'll put uh speed detectors up there that'll tell us what time and what the average speed is. So, what we try to do is analyze it. We have a crime maps meeting every week. We analyze when things are occurring. So, the good thing about the incident that you just uh commented on is that's from a camera. We do have a date and time and uh so we can focus, okay, things are occurring at this time at this location. That's where we try to focus our efforts so that we're a little more efficient than just sitting around waiting. in there. Let me uh let me check any questions online have come up. Yes, um one was how do you see the sheriff's office changing in the next 5 years? So, the question is how do I see the sheriff's office changing in 5 years? So, I think uh the reality is that we uh growth will uh decide that, quite frankly. And so, what we are doing in the sheriff's office now is we currently have three districts. So, we have District 1, which is the Barrier Island, District 2, City of Palm Coast, District 3 is the west side. And we know there's a lot of growth that's occurring and planned specifically uh on the western side of the City of Palm Coast. So there is [clears throat] a committee uh that is designing new districts uh right now and we'll probably end up somewhere between four and five districts to plan for this growth. And that will uh depend on how fast the growth occurs. That could be another district office in the western expansion area. Um but it'll need additional deputies uh clearly based on the growth uh to handle the calls for service cuz while our crime has gone down the calls for service have gone up. They're just not crime related. But somebody still has to respond. It could be a domestic disturbance uh loud those cars, you know, you name it, okay? The last question, it feels like there's a gap between arrests and meaningful convictions. What's happening between law enforcement, prosecution, and sentencing that can lead to reduced accountability? Uh well, that's a that's a great question. Um so, did y'all hear the question? So, it appears by whoever wrote it there's a gap between law enforcement and conviction and accountability. Well, here's what I can say. We do our job. We make the arrest. We don't control the prosecution. We don't control the sentencing. I'll give you an example that just occurred. We took I think it was pretty significant lengthy investigation of a person that was practicing as a nurse uh that was not a licensed nurse. Had about 4,500 patients. Um and worked for a local hospital. And we arrested that individual on multiple felonies and uh a plea deal was offered uh which we don't control uh that resulted in 5 year well, really 3 years minimum up to 5 year probation um and pay a small fine. Adjudication of guilt withheld, which means at the conclusion of everything not considered a convicted felon, so can still carry a firearm, can still vote. Um but we don't control any of that. So, we can control what what we can do. And that is do the best investigation we can make the arrest turn it over to the prosecutor and the judges. And so, if you're unhappy with the disconnect uh you can always vote. Because the three of us uh well, more judges, but the prosecutor, myself are elected and all the judges are elected. So, that's really all you can do. I will tell you I have called out a judge. And um they don't like that too much. Um but I'm not bashful if I see something that's really really egregious and it's consistent. I'm pretty vocal. And uh you know, that person's no longer a judge. Not because of me, but but uh you know, they're not current not one of the current judges, so. Any other questions in the audience? Yes, ma'am. I was curious about ICE that they've been in the community and if you've had to deal with them at all. So, uh the question is about ICE. Yes, ICE has been in Flagler County. Uh under federal law, I'm not allowed to go into great details, uh but I can and well, here's what I can tell you this agency is doing because state law requires us to do this. Um I have what's known as warrant service officers in the jail. Uh they can serve ICE detainers. So, in effect, they're a federal agent when an ICE detainer comes in cuz you have to be a federal agent to serve an ICE detainer. So, they've had to go through the training get the credentials from ICE. They don't get paid by ICE. They get paid by us. But that allows us to serve the detainer. Then ICE has 48 hours to come get them. If they don't come in 48 hours and we don't have local charges by law, I have to release them. We have not had to do that, okay? ICE has been great. The other thing that I have in in my jail, let me just say my jail has been an ICE detainer jail since 2017. It was not used for 4 years by a different presidential administration. Okay. One time, we had to beg them to give us an ICE detainer on a suspect uh that was uh had done a very violent robbery in uh Texas. They didn't even know who their suspect was. They had a suspicious vehicle. Well, we found the vehicle in Flagler did a traffic stop. All we had on them, and even though we recovered jewelry and cash from the vehicle uh all we had was driving on suspended license or driving without a license. Which means they would get kicked out and we begged ICE to give us a detainer. This was a person from El Salvador. And uh had he been released from the jail, he I'm sure he would have been caught. They gave us that one. That's the only time that happened in 4 years under a prior presidential administration. Uh that's not a problem today. Uh what we have also now because state law also requires us to do this is I have what's known as 287G Task Force officers. So, 287G is a federal law that deals with immigration. So, we have um a number of deputies that have been certified and taken the course and are credentialed to be uh immigration task force officers. And so, if we come across somebody that we believe may be in this country illegally, uh but they are they don't currently have an ICE detainer issued. Then, these 287G deputies can go to the scene and start an immigration investigation coordinated with ICE, and then ICE determines whether or not they will issue a detainer. So, uh that is generally what we are doing. I do have another agreement uh with the federal government, but under uh uh under federal law, I'm not allowed to talk about it. Uh all of those questions have to go to uh ICE public information office, but there is some other stuff that we are doing. I will tell you this, as long as I am your sheriff, we will always uh support and work with our federal and state partners. We're not going to be like other cities across the country that forbid their law enforcement to work with a federal partner. I'm not going to do that. And so, uh we have a great relationship and a partnership with all our federal agencies. In fact, uh one of them was here uh yesterday helping us uh find a fugitive. And so, with some technology they have that we don't have. So, we have a great relationship there. All right, any other questions? Otherwise, uh this man. Hey, Shannon. Um how do you get put on the short list for a ride-along in the chopper? For the shopping? At Christmas time? Oh, on the chopper? On the helicopter? Uh no, we're not doing those. Sorry. Now, if there's a legitimate I know you're in the in the public uh information office for the city of Palm Coast. If you get a hurricane and you need to see it, you know, the damage, then we'll consider that, but it has to be really official business in a region. You know? So. I want to thank you for being a great sheriff. Well, I want to thank you. Well, thank you very much. >> [applause] >> But, you know, look Look, I Thank you. Uh who really you should be clapping for is the leadership team in the back and >> [applause] >> and the men and the men and women that serve you, whether they're in a green or white, whether they're sworn or professional support, because look, what I get to do is uh set the vision, uh set the focus for the agency, and and my philosophy is no crime is acceptable, and our job is to reduce crime. Uh we'll never get it to zero. I'm a realist, I get that, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't try. And just cuz we're a fast-growing community doesn't mean we have to accept crime. So, uh that's the way I operate. I set the tone. I get them uh the tools and the staff that they need to deliver for the community. That's my job as sheriff, and then every once in a while they let me go out and play with them. And uh that's my stress relief, and I like going out in there, but uh but anyways, thank you so much for uh coming. For those online, uh thank you for joining us online. The museum, if you haven't seen it, it's open. It's in the public side in the lobby. Feel free to learn about your sheriff's office and its history. Thank you.