{"id":377522,"date":"2026-07-18T01:43:17","date_gmt":"2026-07-18T01:43:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/377522\/"},"modified":"2026-07-18T01:43:17","modified_gmt":"2026-07-18T01:43:17","slug":"east-texas-politics-smith-county-sheriff-da-and-county-judge-sound-off-on-upcoming-budget","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/377522\/","title":{"rendered":"EAST TEXAS POLITICS: Smith County sheriff, DA and county judge sound off on upcoming budget"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"text | article-text\">TYLER, Texas (KLTV) &#8211; Three Smith County leaders join Blake Holland on this week\u2019s edition of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.kltv.com\/news\/east-texas-now\/east-texas-politics\/\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.kltv.com\/news\/east-texas-now\/east-texas-politics\/\">East Texas Politics on East Texas Now<\/a> to discuss the upcoming county budget.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Smith County Sheriff Larry Smith discusses what he\u2019s asking for in the next budget, including pay raises estimated to total around $5 million and more deputies. Smith explains the reasons behind his requests, including the office\u2019s current problems recruiting and retaining deputies.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Smith County District Attorney Jacob Putman joins Holland to talk about lagging salaries and a lack of positions in his office \u2014 and what happens if he doesn\u2019t get what he\u2019s asking for.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Smith County Judge Neal Franklin also joins the conversation, saying he thinks the upcoming budget could be even tighter than the current one. Plus, Franklin addresses whether he thinks the commissioners court will have to raise the tax rate and why he thinks this year\u2019s budget process will be smoother than last year\u2019s.<\/p>\n<p>About the show<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.kltv.com\/news\/east-texas-now\/east-texas-politics\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.kltv.com\/news\/east-texas-now\/east-texas-politics\/\" target=\"_blank\">East Texas Politics on East Texas Now<\/a> streams Fridays at 6:30 p.m. with an encore presentation Sundays at 10 a.m. Viewers can watch at <a href=\"https:\/\/kltv.com\/live\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/kltv.com\/live\" target=\"_blank\">kltv.com\/live<\/a> or using the free KLTV or KTRE apps on Roku, Amazon Fire TV, Apple TV, or Android TV. The show is also available on demand after the Friday night stream.<\/p>\n<p>About the host<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.kltv.com\/authors\/BlakeHolland\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.kltv.com\/authors\/BlakeHolland\/\" target=\"_blank\">Blake Holland<\/a> is a news anchor and reporter for KLTV and KTRE. He anchors East Texas\u2019 most-watched newscasts at 5 and 6 p.m. Since joining KLTV and KTRE in 2018, Holland has covered national political conventions, presidential visits, and interviewed gubernatorial and presidential candidates, plus extensive reporting on regional political news including weekly coverage of Smith County Commissioners Court.<\/p>\n<p>Copyright 2026 KLTV. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"TYLER, Texas (KLTV) &#8211; Three Smith County leaders join Blake Holland on this week\u2019s edition of East Texas&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":377523,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[27,29,28],"class_list":["post-377522","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-texas","tag-texas","tag-texas-headlines","tag-texas-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/377522","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=377522"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/377522\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/377523"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=377522"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=377522"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=377522"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}