The tension inside the chamber was palpable last week as County Commissioner Joe Earman sat on the dais and Sheriff Eric Flowers stood at the podium.
Only hours earlier – at 5 p.m. the day before on the Sheriff’s Office campus – Flowers was conducting a press conference to announce the arrest of Earman’s son, Sam, on stalking-related charges that prompted his firing.
Now, the following morning, Flowers was again asking the commission to further increase his budget for the 2025-26 fiscal year, this time by allocating to him more than $2.5 million in unspent funds returned by the county’s constitutional officers, including the sheriff, and pulling another $964,000 from reserves…