Sarasota sheriff's substation becomes political, signaling rivalry for County Commission

The former South County Sheriff’s Substation, closed in March 2019 by then-sheriff Tom Knight – now a candidate in 2024 for District 3 on the Sarasota County Commission – became a political issue Tuesday, when District 3 incumbent Neil Rainford proposed the commission endorse reopening of the facility.

Rainford brought the topic of reopening the substation up during the regular County Commission meeting and took issue with what he called a 40-mile trip for some South Sarasota County residents to travel to the main Sheriff’s Office at 6010 Cattleridge Boulevard. That is off of Cattlemen Road, just north of the Bee Ridge Road exit off of Interstate 75.

He said constituents wanted to be able to file a report in person, instead of using the current online reporting system available at https://bit.ly/47Y9sdP, travel to the main office for fingerprinting services, or call to have a sheriff’s deputy to come to their home.

“I think that we can supply those services in South County so that they’re not at a disadvantage,” Rainford said. “It seems having Cattleridge up there in North County looks like favoritism to the north part of the county, and I think it’s time we deliver for South County.”

As part of his presentation he circulated an email from Sheriff Kurt Hoffman that read in part: “Based on the feedback that you are receiving from citizens I would welcome a discussion on a plan to reopen our south county office to walk in complaints and other services.

“I am available to discuss any specifics again, thank you for bringing this to my attention. I’ve heard similar comments from citizens myself.”

Rainford also pointed out that the substation was closed by a “previous administration,” referencing Knight.

Knight criticized the rationale behind reopening the building, using the word "antiquated," and questioned the justification for the cost.

Rainford and Knight are both Republicans, and would face each other in a Republican primary next year, which would be open to District 3 voters regardless of political affiliation unless a Democrat files for the seat, too.

The early dust-up underscored the potential for a heated intraparty race and the emerging rivalry that could expose fractures within the local GOP.

Knight had a long tenure as a popular sheriff and one of the most powerful Sarasota County officials. He has deep roots in south Sarasota County and sought the governor's appointment to the District 3 seat when Nancy Detert died earlier this year.

Instead, Rainford had the political backing to gain the appointment, though he lived outside of the district at the time.

Commission Vice Chairman Mike Moran praised Rainford for bringing the matter up, while Commission Chairman Ron Cutisnger said he, too, had heard from constituents about reopening the substation.

“Just by pure demographic growth you could make an argument for this,” Moran said. “The devil’s in the details but I appreciate the leadership on it, I'm happy to have a conversation in it for sure.”

While the commissioners did not yet vote to formally endorse the idea, they also don’t need to.

As a constitutional officer, Hoffman does not need commission approval to reopen the substation, which shares a building with Sarasota County Fire Station 22.

“The main goal of this is a citizen can walk in and say, ‘Hey I had a fender bender,’ (or) ‘somebody wrote me a worthless check,” Hoffman said.

Why was the station closed?

Knight decided to close the substation in March 2019, after the Sheriff’s Office moved out of downtown Sarasota in 2017 so he could put more deputies on patrol rather than stationed at desks. The net effect of that closure was to have two more people each shift actively doing law enforcement.

As part of that plan, instead of having South County residents  travel to the facility on Englewood Road, deputies would travel to residents to take complaints.

“There weren't as many people walking into the office for assistance anymore, we had consolidated all of our detectives when we bought the new building off of Cattleridge Road,” Knight told the Herald-Tribune Tuesday. “The whole idea by getting the building off of Cattleridge Boulevard was to consolidate operations and use technology more and reduce the amount of manpower we needed to run buildings.”

He noted that Hoffman – then a colonel in the department, along with three Sheriff’s Office majors – were part of a meeting where that decision was made and cited Hoffman and now retired Major Paul Richard as among the officers who broached the subject.

Retired Sheriff's Major Jon Goetluck, confirmed that.

“There was a whole big discussion about it, we vetted every possible angle, we did our pros and cons and it was just more efficient,” Goetluck said then added, “There really was no need for that to be reopened.

“Also as a South County resident – obviously with inside knowledge of the agency – I don’t really see service as lacking because of that desk being closed.”

A time of budget austerity

At the time Knight made that decision, he was working in an environment where the County Commission – fearful that two statewide referendums on the November 2018 ballot would reduce funds collected through property taxes – had cut $5.4 million from the 2018-19 budget and declared a spending freeze for the following year.

Not wanting to buck that trend and looking to increase the number of deputies on the street,  Knight said he opted to close it to the public.

“It’s a pretty simple concept, the data was there, the data showed it was unnecessary, we made the decision – the Colonel and Major came to me with a plan – I vetted the plan and now they’re going to go back and spend taxpayer money on an antiquated operation,” Knight said.

“A lot of the data we did on it was basically there was a lot of wasted personnel costs in that we were better served putting more deputies on the street in green and white cars and going to the people when they called rather than having people drive to us,” he added.

The building is still used for training purposes, after the training facility near the Englewood Sports Complex was closed by the county to expand recreational opportunities.

Deputies and detectives still use the facility as a home base and for interviews – similar to how a small substation on Siesta Key is used, though not open to the public, either.

Knight noted that while he was weighing the decision to close the substation, he visited one Saturday, entering by a back door.

He saw one person sitting in the lobby by himself.

“One deputy is playing on the computer and the other is eating chicken wings,” Knight said. “When I went in there and saw that I went back to the office and said we need to shut it down.”

Why reopen the station now?

Hoffman said the growth since 2019 justified taking a look at reopening the substation to the public.

“I’m a South County guy, I drive that every day, the traffic and the construction has increased significantly over four years ago,” Hoffman said, then cited the blossoming of Wellen Park in North Port, growth along State Road 681 north of Venice, and pending development in Winchester Ranch.

He pointed to a 12-month analysis of call volume for the Sheriff’s Office from November 2022 through October 2023 that documented 13,189 service calls. Of those, 48% came from residents south of Clark Road.

“I don’t know if – in fairness to Sheriff Knight and to Major Goetluck – that they have the most recent statistics or are privy to some of the growth I’ve seen,” Hoffman said “I just think these numbers are what they are.

“We’ve got a significant amount of folks calling in or arriving here at the front desk.”

That study is part of a Nov. 14 memo from Sheriff’s Capt. Brigit Leonard and Sheriff's Major Ryan Brown that recommended reopening the substation, suggesting that 31% of those calls should have been handled out of a reopened South County substation.

Hoffman has 20 new deputies in this year’s budget and the proposal calls for two of those deputies to man the reopened substation weekdays from 9 a.m to 5 p.m. with a projected first year cost of each position of $140,650.16 vs. the $215,549.81 first year cost of a patrol deputy – technically a savings of almost $74,900 per position.

Under that proposal, people requiring fingerprinting services would still travel to Cattleridge.

“I still hear, as Commissioner Rainford did and I think Commissioner Cutsigner has, folks would still prefer to drive in and drop off their drugs into our drug box at the south end of the county that they would like to file a report in person,” Hoffman said. “I had one person relay to me that they had a dispute with their neighbor and they didn’t really want to call deputies over to their house because they didn’t want them to see that they were reporting them.”

In theory, Hoffman could hold office hours at the substation, too; he now meets people at the Perkins Restaurant at Center Road and U.S. 41 in Venice; Knight used to meet people at Starbucks and other coffee shops.

A request from South Sarasota constituents

Rainford said shortly after he was sworn in to succeed the late Nancy Detert, after being appointed to the position by Gov. Ron DeSantis, he first heard about mosquito control. The next thing was about reopening the substation and unabashedly links the reopening of the substation to an equity of service for South County residents.

“When I talk to constituents it's the same,” Rainford said. “North County gets the services, so we’re changing that.

“It’s changing under my watch for sure, whether I have 12 more months or eight more years,” he added. “We’re certainly going to make an impact while we can.”

He later stressed that his position on reopening the substation is “100% based on need.

“Obviously anything that I do that might have implications with the former administration might come under scrutiny or whatever, I don’t care,” Rainford said. “That was his only role, to protect South County – which he claims to have a huge stake in – and he removed the Sheriff’s Office.

“If you  want to go there, that would be the political statement: ‘What have you done for South County?’

“The goal is to deliver the same services in South County that North County has always had but North County got more of.

“From my perspective we need to provide the level of service to South County that it deserves, and I think it’s negligent that we closed down that facility with the growth its experienced,” Rainford said.

Knight espoused a different philosophy.

“You don’t throw money and buildings at problems, you throw strategies at problems,” he said.

He later pointed to increased county spending and queried, “I don’t really know if the commissioners are conservatives or just say they’re conservatives,” Knight said. “The budget is going through the roof and when you have the money to spend, you will spend it.

“It's an antiquated operation that’s not well thought out,” he added. “And it just shows the lack of skill of county commissioners who do things like that – who do things politically and not good policy decisions.”

This article originally appeared on Sarasota Herald-Tribune: Proposal to reopen Sarasota County Sheriff's station becomes political