BROWNSVILLE — After 24 years as a deputy with the Hillsboro County (Fla.) Sheriff’s Office, Jimmy Coniglio tried retirement when he moved to Kentucky but got bored.

For the past two years, he has been serving his new community in Edmonson County as a special deputy, having nearly all the same powers as a regular deputy but without compensation. The volunteer lawman enjoys making a difference in the community and often works alongside his wife, Deputy Amanda Coniglio, a full-time paid deputy with the Edmonson County Sheriff’s Department.

Coniglio is one of four special deputies serving the department. The remaining law enforcement officers in the department consist of Sheriff Shane Doyle, five full-time paid deputies and one part-time paid deputy. Other employees either work in court security or tax collections.

Without the volunteer special deputies, Doyle’s law enforcement force would be reduced by nearly 41 percent.

“I would either have to work my deputies 60 hours a week or I would have to cut back on the services we do,” Doyle said.

Like Coniglio, all of Doyle’s special deputies have law enforcement or military backgrounds or related training.

Their contributions save county taxpayers about $87,000 annually, Doyle said. Additionally, the sheriff’s office receives a $28,000 annual contract with U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to patrol the corps’ land near Nolin Lake in Edmonson County. Without the help of the volunteer deputies, that contract could potentially be in jeopardy because the manpower might not be sufficient to enough to cover that patrol, Doyle said.

“We assist in everything from traffic enforcement to warrants, serving papers, traffic control,” Coniglio said. “When you put a bad guy in jail, it makes a difference. It makes the community safer.”

Special Deputy Nate Noble co-owns Rockcastle Shooting Center in Park City and has been a special deputy for seven years.

Noble worked a patrol shift one night last week because two of the full-time deputies were away for training during that time.

“There’s not a lot we haven’t done,” Noble said. “I’ve gone to monitor the campgrounds so Shane could take 911 calls.

“Early on for me, the sheriffs before Shane knew me well enough to know I wasn’t going to do anything stupid,” Noble said. The same can be said for all of the special deputies he serves with.

By law, the only services a special deputy can’t provide are answering domestic violence calls or administering breath alcohol tests. All of the special deputies in Edmonson County are certified to carry and use firearms while on duty, and the law requires that they must provide all of their own equipment, including firearms.

“We’re a force multiplier for the good,” Noble said.

State law allows counties with a population over 10,000 to swear in one special deputy per every 2,500 residents. Counties with a population less than 10,000 can swear in one special deputy per 1,000 residents. Edmonson County’s population is more than 10,000, according to U.S. Census figures.

“There’s no dollar amount you can put on having an extra set of hands and eyes available on something,” Doyle said. “The backup they provide is priceless. It’s just an added layer of safety.”

Edmonson County deputies patrol 308 road miles.

“When you have a department like this that’s so shorthanded and can’t get what they need through budgetary means, any assistance I can give them as a citizen helps tremendously,” Noble said.

In Warren County, where the number of paid deputies is much larger at 37, the county has sworn in 11 special deputies. They are not used in the same capacity as in Edmonson County, yet their services also provide tax savings to Warren County. An exact dollar figure has not been calculated.

Special deputies for the Warren County Sheriff’s Office include the director and assistant director of Warren County Emergency Management. Their special deputy status gives them a level of authority they need to carry out their duties. Two are employees of the Bowling Green-Warren County Regional Airport. Three provide transportation for emergency mental health detainees and four are retired law enforcement officers who comprise the sheriff’s office’s cold case unit.

“The special deputies that we have provide a savings to the taxpayers in many ways without direct patrol functions and services,” Warren County Sheriff’s Office spokesman Stephen Harmon said. “Specifically, the savings come by way of the transports from LifeSkills to Western State Hospital performed by the three special deputies in that area. Without these three special deputies, those often unpredictable calls for transport from here to there would take a uniformed deputy out of the patrol division and tie them up for hours with an already short staff.

“The special deputies in the cold case division provide … years worth of combined law enforcement experience and expertise and provide the detectives in the criminal investigations division an advisory role that is invaluable.

“These examples are just another way the sheriff is able to create resources without the fiscal responsibility of paying for those resources.”

They provide necessary services that county taxpayers would otherwise have to pay a deputy to do, Warren County Sheriff Jerry “Peanuts” Gaines said.

Logan County Sheriff Wallace Whittaker does not have any special deputies. Butler County Sheriff Scottie Ward has one special deputy who is a retired law enforcement officer.

Ward would use the services of his special deputy if he got into a bind, but otherwise that deputy is not used like special deputies in other counties, he said.

Allen County Sheriff Jeff Cooke has eight special deputies, which increases his total personnel by 53.3 percent. Of the eight, three are certified to carry firearms while on duty.

He uses his special deputies for weather-related emergencies as well as prisoner transport and mental health transport. They also back up regular deputies on calls where additional help is needed.

“They’re helpful,” Cooke said.

Coniglio sees himself just like any other law enforcement officer.

“We’ll put our lives on the line for anybody in this county,” he said. “We’ve done it many times.”

— Follow Assistant City Editor Deborah Highland on Twitter @BGDNCrimebeat or visit bgdailynews.com.