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r MAR 15 1994 BOOK 91 PAE 9.84 from federal prisoner reimbursements during the fiscal year. We charge the United States Marshal's Service on a per day per prisoner basis and have been absorbing the expense for those prisoners in our . budget. By affording excellent service to, and - fostering a closer working relationship with the U. S. Marshal's Service, our income from our federal prisoner program has been excellent. I am pleased to report that we have earned $150,000 to February 28, 1994 this fiscal year. To date, the general fund administered by the Board of County Commissioners has been the benefactor of those funds. We expect to meet our forecasted obligations in earnings in April 1994. As you are aware, last summer this office made an emergency purchase of patrol cars through a lease purchase program to shore up the dangerously dilapidated fleet we Inherited. At this point, we will be budgeting a lease purchase payment in next fiscal year's budget. In your budget workshop last week, Commissioners encouraged all County entities to employ reasonable restraint in preparing the 1994-95 budgets. Since we will exceed our federal prisoner program payments to the county, I am requesting that I be allowed to use the remaining federal funds I receive, after we have met the target forecast this fiscal year, for a lease purchase payment before the public budget workshop In September. With that payment, I will make an appropriate reduction in my 1994-95 budget request. We have gone to extraordinary measures to generate this income and I believe using some of those funds to offset our expense is appropriate. Like you, I am concerned about the 1994-95 budget year and believe this request will assist this Office in our budget in the new fiscal year. Accordingly, I am requesting this matter be placed on your agenda March 15, 1994. Sincerely, Ga C. Wheeler, Sheriff GCW:rw Sheriff Gary Wheeler reported that it looks like we will be receiving $400,000 in revenues for this year rather than the $200,000 that was anticipated. He requested that the Sheriff's Department be allowed to use some of this revenue to make advance payments on the lease/purchase contract for new cars in order to save money in interest, retire the debt sooner and save ad valorem tax money in 1994-95. He talked to OMB Director Joe Baird about splitting these funds 50/50, where the County would receive the first $200,000 that was anticipated and budgeted and the Sheriff's Department would receive the second $200,000. Sheriff Wheeler emphasized the aggressive efforts made by his department to get more federal prisoners, noting that when the program was started we were having difficulty getting 10 or 11 a month and yesterday we had 38. We have gone from revenues of $25,000 in October to over $46,000 a month in February and March. Director Baird admitted he probably hadn't expressed himself well when he was discussing this with Sheriff Wheeler, but he had been thinking that the County would receive the first $200,000 plus 50 percent of anything over $200,000. Administrator Chandler advised that we estimated $200,000 in revenues from the federal prisoner program for the 1993-94 year. 12