By JIM BROOKS
Nelson County Gazette / WBRT Radio
Tuesday, Nov. 12, 2025 — Nelson County Judge-Executive has long discussed his concerns with the operation of the Nelson County Sheriff’s Office.
TIM HUTCHJINS
While not specifically focused on the recent indictment of Nelson County Sheriff Ramon Pineroa (and the dismissal of those charges), Hutchins has created a draft of a plan to create a county-funding police agency.
Right now, Nelson Fiscal Court funds 17 active deputies who are mostly involved in the 24/7 business of patrolling county roads and taking care of calls for law enforcement outside the city limits of Bardstown, Bloomfield and New Haven.
Nelson Fiscal Court spends approximately $3.8 million to fund those deputy positions as well as cover the cost of some of the office staff’s benefits. He has been investigating the possibility of using that money toward a 100 percent county funded police department.
In 2000, then-Judge Executive Dean Watts disbanded the Nelson County Police Department and merged those positions — through an agreement — into the Nelson County Sheriff’s Office.
That agreement has been in place ever since.
Hutchins has summarized the problems he has identified in the operation of the Nelson County Sheriff’s Office into a draft of a proposal to separate Fiscal Court’s funding from the sheriff’s office and use it to re-establish a county police department (see document below).
Hutchins’ cites issues that include the sheriff overspending the sheriff’s office budget; the rising costs due to liability claims and lawsuits; a substantial drop in the return of excess fees to fiscal court in 2024; erosion of public trust; high employee turnover; and a lack of communication between Nelson Fisccal Court and the Sheriff’s Office.
EXCESS FEES. The sheriff’s office has typically returns excess fees that the office has collected to the fiscal court — often the total is over $100,000.
According to Hutchins’ documents, in Fiscal Year 2023, the sheriff’s office returned $307,610.47 in excess fees to the fiscal court. However, in 2024, the excess fees dropped to just $10,671 — a 95 percent year-over-year drop.
At the Nov. 4th Nelson Fiscal Court meeting, Pineroa said the drop was due in part to the retirement of one of his deputies.
WILL FISCAL COURT BACK THE PLAN? One of the unanswered questions is if the five member of Nelson Fiscal Court will back Hutchin’s plan to withdraw county funding from the sheriff’s office in order to create a county police force.
At the Nov. 4th fiscal court meeting, Magistrate Keith Metcalf was critical of Pineroa for not advising fiscal court about his department reorganization, and instead, having to read about it first on social media.
In an recent sit-down interview with Hutchins, he explained that he believed most — if not all — of the deputies now working under the sheriff’s office would likely become part of a county police force — if given approval by fiscal court.
Hutchins, who has publicly shared his comments about the sheriff’s office operation and financial issues, believes that the county will have better control of how a county police department operates if it operates under county government control.
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