Robin Kemp, The Current
After months of controversy over how funds from violations in camera-monitored speed zones are spent, the Liberty County Board of Commissioners voted 4-2 to take control of the money from the sheriff. The board had already taken over the bank account Liberty County Sheriff Will Bowman had opened to hold the ticket collections.
The fund has taken in nearly $1.3 million in revenues as of June 2024.
An investigation by The Current uncovered how Bowman had spent the funds, as well as a possible legal loophole that might justify spending on youth activities as a form of community policing. While most of the money went to law enforcement expenses like bulletproof glass for the detectives’ office, Bowman also donated tens of thousands of dollars from the fund to various youth activities, including local school sports and bands that get taxpayer funding from the Liberty County School District.
Under the annual agreement approved July 2, the board will assume “exclusive control” of the account, and it will decide which law enforcement and public safety initiatives will be funded from it. If the board decides the agreement “is no longer advantageous, for whatever reason,” it can cancel the agreement. Either side has 90 days’ notice to cancel. Both sides could then take the matter to court and the funds would be frozen until the dispute is resolved.
Asked whether he would sign the agreement or take the commission to court, Bowman told The Current, “I haven’t even read it. I’m not focusing on them (the Board of Commissioners) right now.”
County Administrator Joey Brown said he expects the results of a compliance audit “hopefully in [the] next couple of weeks.”
Bowman will have to put in a request each time he wants to spend money from the account and the county will have to approve each request. The sheriff’s office cannot write checks on the account, but the county can.
Although Bowman still manages the contract with RedSpeed, and the county has to approve all spending going forward, the county also says it is in no way responsible “for the decisions or actions” of how the sheriff handles the account.
The sheriff also cannot use RedSpeed funds — monies collected by the company operating the cameras – for “any other law enforcement agency, constitutional officer, political subdivision, governmental body, official, or for any other purpose” without the county’s permission.
The agreement does allow the sheriff to give up to 20% of the funds to the Liberty County School Resource Officer program “and other public safety initiatives” for the school system.
The agreement also gives the board the right to make “adjustments” to the sheriff’s budget based on the income from the RedSpeed fines, based on what the board “determines appropriate to reflect such investment and benefit.” Between the time the program started in March 2022 and the most recent data from June 2024, the sheriff’s department brought in $1,275,057.55 in speeding fines, according to data from the county Finance Department’s Samantha Richardson.
County commissions can review sheriff’s budget requests for one thing only: abuse of discretion. The Association of County Commissioners of Georgia notes that, while the county has the power to amend a sheriff’s budget, “once the budget is adopted, a county commission does not have the unilateral authority to refuse to fund expenditures by a county officer — even if it believes that a county officer’s purchases were not made in the exercise of his or her duties. Instead, the board should seek relief from a court by way of a mandamus or declaratory judgment action.”
ACCG cites a 2000 case in which the Supreme Court of Georgia ruled the Coweta County Board of Commissioners could not dictate to the clerk of court — a constitutional officer like the sheriff — how to spend her budget after it approves the budget. (In that case, the commission refused to reimburse the clerk of court for bottled water for her employees, which the clerk bought because the water at the courthouse was “green and slimy.”)
The memorandum of understanding (MOU) had been presented in a previous meeting, County Attorney Kelly Davis said, but the board held off on a final decision. After reconsideration, Kelly asked the board to adopt the agreement. District 2 Commissioner Connie Thrift moved to adopt the agreement, with District 5 Commissioner Eddie Walden seconding.
“As you know, I’ve always been in favor of an MOU, and I’m glad we’ve finally gotten to this point,” said District 5 Commissioner Gary Gilliard. “And I’m going to support the signing of it, but we’re also still going to wait and receive the findings from the compliance audit, which we’ll discuss at a later date. But the MOU as written back in April, I’ve said that’s something that we needed, something we should have had from the start, and I’m glad to this point that we are now ready to sign it, if we get enough support.”
Voting against the agreement were District 1 Commissioner Marion Stevens and District 2 Commissioner Justin Frasier.
Stevens has repeatedly asked whether Bowman had violated the law; county attorney Kelly Davis has replied that Bowman had not broken the law.
District 5 Commissioner Gary Gilliard, who had led the charge against Bowman’s use of the funds, said he was “glad it got to this point.”
The vote comes the same day that band members from Bradwell Institute left Hinesville to march in the Fourth of July Parade in Washington, D.C. Bowman came under fire after donating $20,000 to the band for the trip. When the controversy broke, The Current asked County Chairman Donald Lovette whether he would ask the school to return the $20,000 with only a few weeks before the final trip payment; he said he would not.
O.C.G.A. § 40-14-18, Georgia’s school zone camera law, does not clearly define what “law enforcement or public safety initiatives” are. The commission wants state lawmakers to tighten that language.
Frasier pointed out that, in practice, different cities and counties have applied that law in different ways, and he suggested the board consult with ACCG, the National Association of County Officials, and state legislators about the law.
“Let’s be more uniform,” he said. “Because the conversations that we’ve been having, different counties have been doing it differently, different municipalities have been doing it differently, and I just want to make sure that we have more clarity on this law. Because its interpretation is pretty bad.”
Davis said he would seek more input but added, “I’m afraid that there’s no uniformity for a reason.”
State Rep. Al Williams told The Current, “There are some considerations given and I think the sheriff did not do it knowingly….I think that the legislature will have to clarify that. And we’ll clarify it because it is kind of ambiguous now, so it needs to be narrowly defined.”
The law also states that the “governing body” — in this case, the county commission — gets the traffic camera fine money and that the only thing the “governing body” can use those funds for is “law enforcement or public safety initiatives.” In other words, it’s the commission, not the sheriff, that gets to decide how to spend the money.
The agreement goes farther than state law in defining “law enforcement or public safety purposes” for spending the funds, limiting spending from the RedSpeed fund to:
And when county commissions and sheriffs have taken their funding disputes to Georgia courts, commissions have come out on top.
The Association of County Commissioners of Georgia notes that county commissions are required to provide sheriffs “a reasonable budget” that allows sheriffs and other elected officials “to perform their statutory duties.” However, “While commissioners may not dictate to a county officer how to perform his or her statutory duties, the commission’s decision to set a budget will only be overturned by the court if the court determines that the commission ‘abused its discretion.’” ACCG cites Chaffin v. Calhoun, a 1992 case involving the Henry County Sheriff’s wanting to add 24 deputies to his 125-person force to do patrols and drug enforcement. The Henry County Board of Commissioners wanted to assign those tasks, which fall outside the scope of the sheriff’s duties, to the county police department, and cut the sheriff’s budget by 47%. A judge ruled that was enough for the sheriff to carry out his constitutional duties, even if he had to lay off one of five deputies. The case was upheld on appeal.
In a 1990 case, Board of Commissioners of Randolph County v. Wilson, a lower court ruled that the county commission had abused its discretion when it cut the sheriff’s budget by roughly one deputy’s pay. The sheriff had argued the county had overstepped its authority. However, that case was reversed on appeal and the appeals court set aside the “bad-faith” award from the lower court decision.
And in 1979 in Lovett v. Bussell, the Laurens County sheriff and commission disputed the sheriff’s budget request to pay six deputies the same salaries as similar-ranking Dublin Police officers. A Superior Court judge agreed. The appellate court sided with the county commission, noting the deputies had gotten 10% pay increases each of the previous two years, and that any other decision “would be to delegate to city officials the authority to set county pay scales.”
Bowman’s opponents have pointed to donations the sheriff’s office has made from the traffic fine fund to the band, as well as to athletic activities at BI, Liberty County High, and a youth basketball team.
Despite the criticism, Bowman won the May 21 Democratic primary and faces Republican Gary Eason in the November 5 general election.
Kevin Hofkin, who ran as a Democrat, had called for Bowman to return the donations to the fund.
Republican Gary Eason and his spokesman, James Ashdown, called for an investigation, specifically by a grand jury or the Georgia Bureau of Investigation.
The revenues from the RedSpeed camera fines are “for law enforcement and public safety,” Eason told The Current in April. “None of those [youth group donations] are for law enforcement. The golf carts that he got, yeah, you can use those as far as public safety, SROs can use them around the school. That’s fine. But don’t be taking it to a golf tournament.”
Bowman, 59, was elected in 2020 as Liberty County’s first Black sheriff. He repeatedly stood up for himself in public forums leading up to this year’s May primary, insisting he had done nothing illegal or improper by making those donations.
“I was accountable for everything that I do,” Bowman told the Liberty County Democratic Party Candidate Forum on April 20. “I have a flawless military career. I have a flawless Georgia State Trooper career. I am well known across this state. And even other states. I am well respected in the Georgia Sheriffs Association. So when anybody tries to attack my character, they’ve got to pick another route….I will go face to face anywhere, anytime with any candidate that’s running for sheriff.”
Eason told The Current he supports the agreement: “I think it’s a very good thing. That way, it keeps up with the checks and balances….I agree with it.”
Eason pointed out that Bowman was ultimately responsible for how the money was spent, regardless of who signed the checks.
He also backs tightening up the vague definition of “public safety initiatives” in the state statute.
“Public safety to me could be anything, whether it be EMTs, firefighters, police force, and all that. To me, they could use that money to buy child restraint seats. When a vehicle gets in an accident, there’s a child restraint seat in that vehicle, and [could be] replaced with a new one. They could use that money for that purpose.” Or, he said, a drug awareness program for kids: “‘Hey, don’t use drugs.’ That’s public safety to me.”
But, Eason said, that doesn’t extend to footing the bill for student activities like band trips: “I do not believe sending [the band] to Washington, DC would have been under that….It should not have come out for [sports] uniforms for the school and all that. If they want to give the school money, how about doing a fundraiser or something? Get the sheriff’s department to say, ‘Hey, we’re going to wash cars out here for donations’.”
Williams, who is entering his 12th term under the Gold Dome, says he has faith in Bowman.
“I think (the) sheriff does a good job,” he told The Current, “and I think he’s cognizant of the concerns of the people, and I have no doubt that he will be in compliance in any way asked.”
This story comes to GPB through a reporting partnership with The Current.
