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An increase in officer involved shooting investigations and an increasing number of prison deaths is stretching resources at the Florida Department of Law Enforcement. Which as Mike Vasilinda tells us, is forcing FDLE to make hard choices.

Heroin deaths are skyrocketing in Florida. Up from 197 in 2013 to 408 last year….and eight times higher than 2010 when there were about 50 deaths.

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The increase comes as the Florida Department of Law Enforcement, which lost 360 people during the recession,  is being asked to investigate increasing numbers of prison deaths and officer involved shootings. FDLE Commissioner Rick Swearingen says the workload is stretching agents thin.

“You do have to prioritize, and I can tell you we are currently working, for example, 40 percent less drug cases than we worked five years ago” says Swearingen.

FDLE is still down more than 250 people since the recession.

The agency is asking for three point four million dollars. That will hire 26 new agents.

If approved, those agents will go to Miami, Orlando, Tampa and Jacksonville, where their primary roles will be to investigate prison deaths and officer shootings.

“We estimated, based on the numbers we had, that we would work about sixty of those a year. What we have found is that since January, we’ve opened about one hundred and fifty of those” says Swearingen.

The good news is that crime is at a 44 year low. But to keep it moving in the right direction: “We can prioritize, but as some point we need additional bodies.”

And that decision is up to lawmakers, who will also have to prioritize between public safety and a billion dollar tax cut sought by the Governor.

Low pay at FDLE has also resulted in more than 100 lab technicians leaving for higher paying jobs with local police agencies. FDLE is also asking lawmakers to increase their base pay, by ten thousand dollars a year, but that will still leave them making about 14 thousand below the state average.