With a tax rate that’s revenue neutral, millions of dollars in budget requests weren’t granted as a part of County Manager Aaron Church’s recommendation to commissioners. One of the many items left out is body cameras for sheriff’s deputies.

In the wake of police-involved shootings across the country, activists and law enforcement alike have looked to body cameras as a method of transparency. Earlier this year, the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department began rolling out body cameras for its officers. The North Carolina State House has also included a funding method for body cameras in its budget.

Body cameras represent $45,600 of the $16 million in requests that aren’t funded in Church’s proposed budget. Some requests were for new equipment or positions. Others were an expansion of current line items such as maintenance.

Rowan County’s proposed tax rate for the coming fiscal year is 66.25 cents per $100, a small increase from the current rate of 65 cents per $100. The rate increase is considered revenue neutral because the county would generate the same amount of money through property taxes. A property owner whose value didn’t change, however, would see an increase. On a $100,000 home, taxes would go from $650 per year to $662.50 per year.

Sheriff Kevin Auten said the department decided to “just throw it out there as an idea” for the coming fiscal year.

“We don’t want to have a knee jerk reaction to whats going on around the country and do something that’s not cost effective,” Auten said.

The request was f0r 50 body cameras at about $900 a piece.

The sheriff’s office has a couple of body cameras that have been tested, Auten said. He called them cheap, however, saying that less expensive cameras often aren’t user friendly and make downloading footage difficult.

“With better cameras, it’s easier to download and store the footage,” he said. “With cheap cameras, dealing with it on the backend is just a nightmare.”

Auten said the department “can operate fine” without the body cameras. The cameras, however, are an item Auten says he is supportive of purchasing.

“Everybody acts different because they know the camera is running,” he said. “No matter which side it is, most people tend to act different when they know they’re being recorded.”

If not funded by county commissioners, body cameras could come to the sheriff’s office in the form of state grants proposed in North Carolina’s budget. Amendment No. 41 to the state’s budget would provide grants to local law enforcement agencies for body-worn cameras.

The amendment would provide grants not to exceed $100,000 to law enforcement agencies. The local agencies however, would be required to double the grant amount with matching funds. For example, if the Rowan County Sheriff’s Office received a $50,000 grant to pay for body cameras, it would have to provide $100,000 in local, matching funds.

Auten was asked about the sheriff’s office budget before the state’s measure passed, but mentioned that funding from Rowan County could provide matching funds for a grant. Combining two sources of money would allow the department to purchase higher-quality cameras, he said.

Other items in the sheriff’s office budget include:

• An uptick of more than $100,000 in salary related expenditures

The increase is included in Church’s recommended budget to commissioners. It represents a carryover of cost of living increases from the prior fiscal year.

Church said the increase only represents cost being moved from one area of the budget to another.

• The purchase of 18 new vehicles for the sheriff’s office

The 18 vehicles, which are included in Church’s recommendation, are a decrease from last year, when the sheriff’s office replaced a larger portion of its fleet. The county routinely replaces vehicles at a certain mileage for the sheriff’s office.

• The addition of an electronic crime investigator to the sheriff’s office

The position wasn’t included in Church’s recommended budget. It’s total cost was projected to be $106,306 — a cost that includes salary, benefits and equipment.

The investigator, if funded, would specifically focus on portions of crimes that involve communication through the Internet, Auten said. He used Facebook as one medium that could be involved in investigations.

Contact reporter Josh Bergeron at 704-797-4246.