We submitted a public information request to El Paso County for “a list of employees of the El Paso County Sheriff’s Office (to include all police officers) who have received overtime pay from October 1, 2025 to the present” and for “the total amount of overtime pay for each of the employees.”
We learned that the El Paso County Commissioners Court has been demanding the same information from the Sheriff’s Office since April but has received nothing.
Fortunately, Susana Miranda of the El Paso County Attorney’s Office produced the documentation we requested three days ago and we are ready to share our preliminary analysis.
Hundreds of employees in the Sheriff’s Office received overtime pay but the amount some received is astounding.
20 employees were paid between $80,767 and $152,185 in overtime for a total of $2,135,513. In every case, the overtime pay exceeded their FY 2025 salary by a wide margin.
Of these employees, 13 are detention officers, 2 are floor control officers, 2 are deputy sheriffs, 2 are sergeants, and 1 is a detention sergeant.
One detention officer, who earned a salary of $85,356 in FY 2025, was paid $152,185 in overtime in FY 2026, thus receiving more than $237,000 in compensation this past fiscal year.
These figures are part of the reason the Sheriff’s Office was more than $5.9 million in the red in FY 2026.
Sheriff Oscar Ugarte has a lot of explaining to do.