I’ve written before about Sheriff Joe Arpaio, the sheriff of Maricopa County, AZ. He’s been sheriff there since he retired from the Drug Enforcement Administration after 32 years of service as a narcotics agent.

Sheriff Joe first was elected in 1993, and is now beginning his fourth consecutive term. He won his latest primary with 83% of the vote.

You may already know about Sheriff Joe because of stories about prisoners in the Maricopa County Jail living in pink painted cells and wearing pink jumpsuits. He also feeds them bologna sandwiches to save on the jail budget — and they pay 40 cents for meals in the jail.

The only TV stations available to inmates are the Disney and weather channels.

Some Maricopa County inmates sleep outdoors in a tent city that’s surrounded by barbed and razor wire. The temperature in Phoenix, AZ., as I write this, is 106 degrees.

A few prisoners complain about the Arizona heat, but Sheriff Joe always reminds them of what living conditions are like for our troops serving in Iraq.

Sheriff Joe tells jailhouse whiners: "If you don’t like it here, don’t come back."

Now there’s a new chapter being written in Sheriff Joe’s career: He noticed that Maricopa County was spending $18 million a year on stray cats and dogs—so he offered to take over the program.

Sheriff Joe now operates the animal shelter using inmate labor, most of whom work for free. Some inmates get 28 cents an hour which is paid for out of "adoption fees."

Pets are properly fed, walked twice a day, with all animal care provided by Maricopa County Jail inmates. Adopting families pay $78, which covers all shots plus an ID implant. Under Sheriff Joe, the budget for this stray animal program is $3 million, compared to $18 million before he took over the program.