{"id":139357,"date":"2026-07-15T20:08:05","date_gmt":"2026-07-16T02:08:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/montezuma-county-commissioners-seek-audit-of-sheriffs-office-after-disputing-budget-cuts-claims\/"},"modified":"2026-07-15T20:36:38","modified_gmt":"2026-07-16T02:36:38","slug":"montezuma-county-commissioners-seek-audit-of-sheriffs-office-after-disputing-budget-cuts-claims","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/montezuma-county-commissioners-seek-audit-of-sheriffs-office-after-disputing-budget-cuts-claims\/","title":{"rendered":"Montezuma County commissioners seek audit of sheriff\u2019s office after disputing budget cuts claims"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"Montezuma
Montezuma County Sheriff Steve Nowlin and the Montezuma County Board of County Commissioners discussed the sheriff\u2019s office budget at a BOCC meeting on Tuesday. (Bailey Duran\/Special to The Journal)<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Montezuma County Commissioners approved a forensic audit into the sheriff\u2019s office and detention center at a Board of County Commissioners meeting on Tuesday. An internal investigation is also underway.<\/p>\n

The action was taken after Sheriff Steve Nowlin and MCSO Detective Sgt. Victor Galarza told The Journal<\/em> commissioners made budget cuts that led to the Montezuma County Narcotics Investigation Team\u2019s disbandment \u2013 a claim commissioners vehemently disputed<\/a>.<\/p>\n

BOCC Vice Chairman Kent Lindsay moved that the commissioners approve the forensic audit of the detention center\u2019s and sheriff\u2019s office\u2019s finances for the past five years, which he estimated could cost around $50,000.<\/p>\n

With a forensic audit, a \u201cclearer picture\u201d of funding could be painted and would settle the dispute \u201cone way or another,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere was a lot of discussion in this last primary election about transparency,\u201d Lindsay said. \u201cLet\u2019s bring it all to the surface.\u201d<\/p>\n

A tense discussion between commissioners and Nowlin ended with Nowlin being dismissed from the meeting.<\/p>\n

Galarza told The<\/em> Journal<\/em> on June 29 he would be leaving Cortez due to the narcotic team\u2019s disbandment<\/a>. Following his and Nowlin\u2019s statements, the BOCC posted on Facebook<\/a> that they didn\u2019t know the team had been disbanded.<\/p>\n

At the meeting, the BOCC displayed a large photo of the sheriff\u2019s office\u2019s budget during Nowlin\u2019s tenure from 2015 through the present. According to the data, the sheriff\u2019s office was given a budget of $6,990,875 in 2025 and a budget of $7,341,485 in 2026.<\/p>\n

\"The
The Sheriff Office\u2019s budget from 2015-2026, which is Sheriff Nowlin\u2019s tenure. (Montezuma County)<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

BOCC Chairman Jim Candelaria asked Nowlin about the disbandment of MCNIT.<\/p>\n

\u201cWho said it\u2019s been disbanded? I never said it was disbanded, we\u2019re just not operational with it,\u201d Nowlin said.<\/p>\n

Candelaria later asked what the word \u201cdisbandment\u201d means to Nowlin.<\/p>\n

The conversation shifted back and forth between discussions of MCNIT and the budget.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou didn\u2019t cut the budget; you didn\u2019t fund what we asked for,\u201d Nowlin said when the topic veered back to the budget.<\/p>\n

Candelaria said a lot of people didn\u2019t receive the funding they requested.<\/p>\n

Outside of the sheriff\u2019s office\u2019s budget, it was revealed that $91,000 in capital funds was approved for radio and taser upgrades for the detention center; $71,000 for a \u201cfully upfitted\u201d detentions transport van; and $47,000 was discussed and approved \u2013 although is still in review \u2013 for rifle-rated armor. An additional $101,000 was reportedly added to various other line items in the budget after the sheriff\u2019s office\u2019s contract with Dolores was completed.<\/p>\n

Later on in the meeting, following the discussion with the sheriff, the BOCC shared that the total loss in tax dollars for the county in 2026 is currently $876,775.94. With the decrease of oil and gas \u2013 particularly with Kinder Morgan, the biggest producer in the county \u2013 it is difficult for budgets to be put together where everyone is satisfied.<\/p>\n

The tax money generated from 2018-2026 hit its peak in 2020, with $4,344,879.73. This year, that amount is $2,192,390.25.<\/p>\n

It was also noted that the 2025 (unaudited) returns from the sheriff\u2019s budget was $509,507 for the sheriff\u2019s office and detention center.<\/p>\n

\u201cHow can you make that statement (about the budget being cut)?\u201d Candelaria asked.<\/p>\n

Nowlin said the budget cut happened with resources and the budget increased because of increased salaries and fringe benefits.<\/p>\n

Galarza was the sole representative from the sheriff\u2019s office for MCNIT, but his departure leaves that position empty.<\/p>\n

Nowlin has recently removed a crime analyst from his role and into another role because the office was short on patrol deputies and in the detention center, where the turnover rate is the highest. He said he is shy of two detectives. The office currently has one certified detention deputy and is waiting for the three recent hires to go through their first phase of training.<\/p>\n

The conversation moved back to MCNIT, with an unapproved request of $15,000 for \u201cdope buy money\u201d \u2013 money used for undercover officers to buy drugs from suspected drug dealers \u2013 was brought up. Nowlin said there was no asset forfeiture seizure money left, and there had only been $60,000 in operating money to pull from for the year.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere are line-item adjustments that can be made if you felt that it was absolutely a priority to you,\u201d Candelaria said, adding that the buy money hadn\u2019t been approved because \u201cwe did not feel that it was pertinent to this community to spend $15,000 for dope buy money.\u201d<\/p>\n

Candelaria said that Nowlin\u2019s leadership team would be called to submit the 2026 budget since it has not yet been submitted by the sheriff.<\/p>\n

Nowlin said the budget was in the works and would be finished by Friday.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve been pretty busy and short-handed,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Nowlin also requested that the budget decisions for MCSO be done in public to avoid the \u201cnonsense\u201d and misunderstandings currently taking place.<\/p>\n

\u201cAbsolutely,\u201d Candelaria said. \u201cThe lies that you have been budget-cut, it\u2019s not true. It\u2019s inaccurate. It\u2019s dishonest.\u201d<\/p>\n

The sheriff once again tried to explain some of the line items in his budget.<\/p>\n

\u201cNo, that\u2019s not dishonest,\u201d Nowlin said. \u201cYou can paint it any way that you want, but I\u2019m looking at each one of those line items \u2013\u201d<\/p>\n

Before Nowlin could finish his sentence, Candelaria dismissed him from the meeting.<\/p>\n

bduran@the-journal.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

BOCC members say MCSO\u2019s budget increased \u2013 not decreased \u2013 from 2025 to this year<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":139358,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5736,5735],"tags":[21,1820,28,60,109,29,1351,6419],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-139357","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-local-news","category-news","tag-cortez","tag-dh-trueanthem","tag-headlines","tag-montezuma-county","tag-montezuma-county-commissioner","tag-newsletter","tag-public-finance","tag-tj-trueanthem"],"acf":[],"author_name":"Website Administrator","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/139357","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=139357"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/139357\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":139359,"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/139357\/revisions\/139359"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/139358"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=139357"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=139357"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=139357"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=139357"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}