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The Broward Sheriff’s Office’s controversial Regional Training and Development Center, which figures prominently in the Florida DOGE task force’s demands for financial information.
Florida DOGE orders Broward Sheriff Tony to turn over financial records; Tony tells staff he complied
The Florida DOGE task force created by Gov. Ron DeSantis to identify wasteful government spending has ordered Broward Sheriff Gregory Tony to turn over a broad set of BSO financial records dating to 2022.
Florida Bulldog obtained a copy of DOGE’s four-page May 28 letter to Tony seeking detailed information about BSO contracts, bid documents, all purchase orders and payments over $5,000, invoices, change orders, vendors and personnel costs. The letter, signed by DOGE “team leader” Eric Soskin and budget office director Leda Kelly, said the information was to be compiled by Thursday, June 11, and warned of “financial penalties” for an “untimely response.”
Tony told his staff in a Friday afternoon email that “BSO has fully complied with all the information requests and will continue to collaborate with them throughout the review process.” He also said he had volunteered for DOGE’s scrutiny. “We welcomed the opportunity to participate with DOGE to demonstrate the transparency, accountability and fiscal responsibility that guide our organization,” he said.
BSO’s compliance with the state financial review comes as the sheriff has submitted a new budget request to the county of $937.4 million for 2026-27. It also comes as Tony continues to seek an additional $73.7 million from the county for the current year. He has called that a “funding gap” created when the county cut his initial $1 billion request last year.
Tony has appealed the county’s cuts to the Florida Administration Commission, chaired by DeSantis and including Attorney General James Uthmeier, Chief Financial Officer Blaise Ingoglia and Agriculture Commissioner Wilton Simpson. A hearing had been set for last February but was abruptly called off. In his Friday email to staff, Tony said a hearing is still pending.
“The next possible date is September 15,” he wrote.
WHAT DOGE WANTS TO SEE
The letter from DOGE, the so-called Department of Government Efficiency, sought 13 categories of BSO records, including some tied to the sheriff’s most controversial spending.
They include:
BSO’s purchase of Airbus helicopters. BSO’s aviation unit has three Airbus H125 aircraft, the most recent purchased in late 2024. The agency’s Fire Rescue division recently bought two H145 Airbus helicopters. Tony has described them as “state-of-the-art.” Last year, the helicopters were part of the budget dispute between the sheriff and the County Commission, which said Tony misspent about $15 million allocated to replace a crashed helicopter as a down payment on the three new aircraft. The county, and ultimately taxpayers, later had to pay the remaining $24 million balance.
All contract documents for BSO’s Regional Training and Development Center. The center, largely a gymnasium where Tony regularly trains and promotes himself in social media videos, was originally estimated to cost $34 million. But after the county allowed Tony to personally oversee the project, multiple change orders helped push developer ANF Group’s construction costs to nearly $74 million by the time the center opened in July 2024. Auditors also found that BSO made $1.4 million in apparent overpayments to the Davie-based builder.Florida Bulldog also reportedthat ANF contributed a total of $30,000 to Tony’s political committee, Broward First.
BSO’s active contracts with SaferWatch LLC, which makes a panic button and emergency mass-alert system popular with public officials and law enforcement. In February, SaferWatch founder and CEO Geno Roefaro was arrested in New York onfederal bribery chargesand is awaiting trial. Tony personally promoted Roefaro’s business and, through his political committee, accepted tens of thousands of dollars from him.
BSO’s municipal services contracts for FY 2022-23 and 2023-24. Under previous sheriffs, BSO expanded as the police force of choice for more than a dozen municipalities and the county. Under Tony, that trend has reversed. Deerfield Beach ended its contract earlier this year, and the county is considering dropping its agreements with BSO for service at the airport and Port Everglades.
Personnel costs for 2024-25 and 2025-26. DOGE sought full position counts by division, the share of those costs tied to municipal service contracts, copies of BSO salary studies, and the related contracts, including vendor names, contract values and scope of work. The sheriff has fought with the county for years over deputy pay. Tony says deputies are underpaid and that the result has been a steady loss of talent. The county has countered that Tony used money allocated for raises on other priorities, including BSO’s training center.
Sheriff Tony’s top staff model the gold rings he gave them in February 2025.
WHAT DOGE DIDN’T ASK ABOUT
DOGE did not ask about several other controversial financial matters. Among the most prominent are the gold rings, topped with a sheriff’s gold star set against an emerald-green backdrop and ringed by what appear to be small diamonds, that Tony presented to members of his executive command staff in March 2025. The sheriff has said no public funds were used to buy as many as two dozen of the rings, but he has declined to identify how and from who the rings were obtained.
DOGE also did not ask BSO to document how much Tony spends on the video crews that appear to follow him regularly, especially in the gym. Tony uses those videos, often enhanced with special effects and sound, to bolster his image and maintain a near-constant presence on Instagram and other social media platforms.
Nor does the letter indicate that DOGE will examine tens of millions of dollars in discrepancies in the lengthy budgets BSO releases each year for both police and fire rescue services. Florida Bulldog reported on those discrepancies in February.
DOGE, which this week filed a similar demand for financial records with the City of Fort Lauderdale, asked Tony for direct access to BSO’s computer system to obtain the records. “We prefer that you make available read-only electronic access to the relevant data systems to our team so that we can download information directly.”
It was not immediately known if such access was given.
Broward Sheriff Dr. Gregory Tony wants the State of Florida to force Broward County to give him a hefty budget increase. He wants it so badly that he and a team of his top brass are planning to travel to Tallahassee to appeal the county’s partial denial of his unprecedented billion-dollar-plus proposal.
While state law grants county commissions broad discretion to set budgets for the constitutional officers they fund, including sheriffs, Tony seems wired to win.
The Florida Administration Commission, which will decide the matter, is chaired by Gov. Ron DeSantis, an ally who originally appointed Tony as sheriff seven years ago and has stood by him despite Florida Department of Law Enforcement findings that:
Tony lied under oath to obtain a Florida driver’s license,
lied about his prior LSD use on an application to become a police officer in Coral Springs and
failed to disclose his arrest for murder as a juvenile in Philadelphia when applying for jobs as a police officer and to the governor before his appointment as sheriff.
Tony was acquitted.
The other three commission members are in DeSantis’s Cabinet: Attorney General James Uthmeier, DeSantis’s former chief of staff; Chief Financial Officer Blaise Ingoglia and Agriculture Commissioner Wilton Simpson. The Florida Channel was scheduled to broadcast the Cabinet meeting on Tuesday, but the sheriff’s portion has apparently been canceled. We will provide a new date and time when it becomes available.
If Tony succeeds, as much as $73.7 million in county funds could be diverted to BSO and taken away from other county needs this fiscal year. That’s the so-called “funding gap” Tony has identified since the county trimmed his requested overall budget increase of nine percent – to $1.009 billion – to just over three percent, or $935.34 million in September.
TENS OF MILLIONS IN BSO BUDGET DISCREPANCIES
A Florida Bulldog review found the sheriff’s adopted budgets for BSO’s Department of Law Enforcement Services (DLE) contain tens of millions of dollars in discrepancies when “revenues collected and budgeted” are compared with the detailed expenses provided for its police service contracts with a dozen municipalities, the county’s international airport, Port Everglades and the sheriff’s Regional Communications Division. Also included are the revenue and expense numbers for DLE’s Special Details Unit which, for a fee, contracts with local businesses and governmental agencies to provide deputies for extra duty work handling security at events.
Tens of millions in additional budget discrepancies were found when comparing the Department of Fire Rescue’s revenues to the detailed expense pages for contracted services provided to eight municipalities, Port Everglades and the aviation rescue unit. The Fire budget tables are below. This story, however, will focus on BSO’s policing contracts.
The two most recent fiscal years where “actual” dollar amounts are provided in BSO’s published budgets are 2022-2023 and 2023-2024. In those two years, the discrepancies for DLE police services totaled $29.3 million. Fire and Emergency Medical Services (EMS) budget discrepancies in the same two-year period amounted to $25.3million – swelling all discrepancies for BSO contract services in those two fiscal years to $54.6 million.
One of the largest single discrepancies we found involves BSO’s Special Details Unit.
The adopted budget book for the current fiscal year that ends Sept. 30, 2026 states the unit’s “actual” revenue in fiscal year 2023-2024 was $9.74 million, or more specifically $9,738,103.
But the backup information that details the unit’s expenses, largely for personnel, totals $4.85 million – a difference of $4.88 million. To make understanding even more difficult, last year’s 2024/2025 budget lists the prior year’s budget as $10.5 million.
We asked Broward County’s Independent Auditor Bob Melton about that discrepancy and others. (Melton’s office does not audit BSO.) He gave us his observations but did not conduct an audit.
“Our understanding is that contracted services should be provided at actual cost, whereas this information appears to show revenues are exceeding costs by several million dollars for special [detail] services,” he said. “However, keep in mind that cost can be defined in several different ways. For example, one could only include direct costs, or cost could also include allocation of central services, etc.”
Al Lamberti, a longtime BSO operations commander who also served as Broward Sheriff from 2007 to 2013, looked over the budget number comparisons.
” In light of the fact that BSO is appealing its budget request to the Governor and Cabinet members for a budget increase, these discrepancies are very concerning,” he said. “The total amount for two years could have funded the Sheriff’s alleged budget shortfall. As a former sheriff, I understand sound budgeting requires independent oversight, routine internal and external audits, and complete transparency, so that the public can have confidence on how their tax dollars are managed. An independent annual budget audit is required by state statute. All sheriffs have an obligation to protect the public, not only physically, but fiscally as well.”
Why don’t BSO’s numbers match up? Where did the money go? While the reason for those discrepancies and others indicates significant fiscal mismanagement, it does not necessarily mean there is any missing money or that there has been any fraud or theft of public funds. A forensic audit would be needed to make such a determination.
BSO’s Division of Internal Audit Services, part of the Office of Inspector General’s Office, handles all types of audits for the agency. BSO Maj. Barry Lindquist was promoted to IG last year, and has been an assistant IG since 2020, according to BSO’s website.
Lindquist did not return phone and emailed questions last week asking whether the IG’s office conducts financial audits of BSO’s budgets. (The IG’s annual report for 2023-2024, the only annual report published on its web page, states that it conducted 187 audits in 2023 and says four were completed. None of the four, as described in the report, involved BSO’s budget.)
Instead, Florida Bulldog’s inquiries were forwarded to BSO’s public information office, which said Friday it would “research” the matter.
The Inspector General’s Office touts its independence. But all that really means is that Lindquist is independent of BSO’s various department heads. Like most every BSO employee, the Inspector General serves at the pleasure of Sheriff Tony. He also reports directly and solely to him “to ensure audit-related activities and investigations are performed independent of any influence or direction” from anyone except the sheriff. That’s not exactly a confidence builder for the IG’s stated goal of “promoting both accountability and transparency.”
In his appeal to the state, Tony accused the county of supplying BSO with inadequate funding for years, and making “arbitrary and capricious” cuts to his current budget. Among other things, he argued those cuts are evidence of a lack of support for public safety. The sheriff has said repeatedly he wants to give pay hikes to deputies to fix “salary disparities” with other police agencies. His 75-page appeal contends that quick action is needed to ensure BSO’s ability to maintain public safety for Broward’s residents and visitors.
SHERIFF TONY VS. BROWARD COUNTY
The county’s 71-page reply, signed by County Attorney Andrew Meyers, defends its commitment to public safety, noting among other things that BSO receives more funding than any other county agency and accounts for 49.64 percent of its annual general, property tax funded budget. It also contends that Tony, an elected constitutional officer whose authority flows from the state’s constitution, did not adequately justify his enormous budget request to the county commission and has been less than honest in his public remarks about the dispute. For example, it contends BSO has received plenty of money for personnel raises, but the sheriff chose instead to divert those funds to other purposes.
Broward County also accuses BSO of “financial mismanagement,” citing Tony’s diversion of funds from salaries to cover cost overruns on capital projects, notably his pet project, BSO’s $73.7-million training center. The center, which opened in July 2024, was plagued by an $18.2-million budget overrun – beyond the county’s appropriation of $55.5 million – and was caused by numerous change orders initiated by the sheriff’s office without county approval, the response says.
The county’s assessment of Tony’s financial mismanagement does not mention any of the numerous discrepancies found by Florida Bulldog. Instead, it focuses on his handling of the training center fiasco, Tony’s use of “misleading” statements to the county commission to obtain helicopter funding and his “posturing and gamesmanship” amid the 911 call center staffing crisis in 2022-2023.
Some of the BSO budgetary discrepancies we found for the two fiscal years of 2022-2023 and 2023-2024 appear to advantage the sheriff’s office, meaning revenues from its police services contracts with its municipal customers exceeded the cost of providing those services. More often, though, BSO’s municipal customers appear to have come out ahead, with what they paid in their contracts being less than BSO’s costs – at least according to BSO’s faulty budget numbers.
The discrepancies are most readily apparent when looking at full year budget numbers. For example, the current adopted budget for 2025/2026 states that in 2023/2024 DLE’s contract services brought in revenue of $274,705,732. The previous year’s 2024/2025 budget, however, says that in 2023/2024 DLE collected nearly $20 million more in contract services revenue, or $294,373,310. It is anyone’s guess as to which number is correct.
BSO’s budget numbers are similarly out of whack for the DLE’s 2022-2023 budget. Its adopted budgets for 2025/2026 and 2024/2025 agree that DLE’s contract revenues were $259,525,849 in 2022/2023. But its 2023/2024 budget says the DLE’s contract revenues for 2022/2023 were $282,992,030 – a nearly $23.5 million difference.
The reported numbers for the sheriff’s municipal contracts, while containing numerous discrepancies, cut both ways as to whether the municipality or BSO came out ahead.
For example, according to BSO’s current 2025/2026 budget that ends Sept. 30 the “actual” revenues it collected from Oakland Park in 2023-2024 were $18.1 million and expenses were $17.9 million – or $214,316 on the plus side for BSO.
But the current budget’s numbers for 2022-2023 flip in Oakland Park’s favor. That year BSO’s revenue from Oakland Park was $17,172,399 and its reported cost to supply police services to that city was $17,195,497. Oakland Park came out ahead by $23,098.
Sheriff Tony’s appearance in Tallahassee Tuesday before Gov. DeSantis and his Cabinet, sitting as the Florida Administration Commission whose duties include resolving sheriffs budget appeals, will apparently be a first for a Broward sheriff.
Yet some police chiefs have wondered why, given BSO’s own large budget discrepancies, he’s appealing.
Said one Broward chief, “How can you ask for more money when your own numbers don’t add up?”
