By Linda Martz, Mansfield News Journal (Ohio)
MANSFIELD, Ohio - A proposal to cut three police supervisor jobs - and use the savings to hire patrol officers - became the latest fracas City Council must resolve on the way to approving a 2005 budget.
Eliminating those jobs is opposed by the Fraternal Order of Police “gold” wing, which represents police supervisors.
Chief Phil Messer unveiled a proposal to reorganize the department Monday. The plan would eliminate two sergeants and one captain.
Messer said some of those slots became vacant more than two years ago and remain unfilled. The proposal before council would permanently eliminate the three positions, he said. That could free up more than $200,000 in the police budget, Messer said.
“We are trimming management, in hopes of putting more strength in patrol,” the chief said.
Messer said the department has 82 officers, 20 people shy of authorized strength. “The critical need right now is for officers on the street.”
Eliminated posts would include a community policing sergeant and one of the city’s two detective sergeant positions. Duties of the eliminated captain’s job - formerly held by Messer - would be shared by the chief and other administrators.
City officials said the fire chief is likely to come to council with similar cost-cutting proposals in two weeks.
Fraternal Order of Police President Michael Bammann asked council to table action on the police reorganization for two weeks, adding he learned of the proposal only four hours before council met Monday.
Council President Virginia Imhoff said council might need more time to consider the plan. But Finance Committee Chairman Dave Robinson suggested waiting until council meets tonight at 7:30 to decide whether to delay voting. No decision was made.
Bammann said no city administrator has guaranteed the city will increase the number of patrolmen from 75 to 78 officers if supervisor positions are eliminated. The FOP suspects no hirings will occur, he said. “Those (positions) are ghosts,” he said.
Eliminating supervisors will hurt police operations, Bammann said. “Most all patrolmen know what their job is. But there are many things occurring every day that require supervisors to make those decisions.”
If the city does hire new officers, young patrol officers will need more supervision, not less, Bammann said.
Mayor Lydia Reid said she won’t know how much hiring is possible until the finance director completes budget projections, possibly this week.
Reid said the city was progressing on plans to hire more entry-level patrol officers when a conciliator turned in a binding decision on an FOP request for a pay increase. That decision, granting police 6-percent pay raises over the last two years of their contract, “threw a monkey wrench” into budgeting, the mayor said.
FOP officials “did not point out that we haven’t had anyone in that captain’s position for two and a half years -- ever since Phil became chief,” Reid said.
With the elimination of a sergeant in community policing, patrol officers would be asked to step in as time permits to keep in touch with neighborhood groups, Messer said.
The community policing division dropped from from more than 10 officers five or six years ago, to two - at a time when the city saw rapid growth in neighborhood watch associations, up from 29 in 2003 to 48 groups now, he said.
Council is expected to vote on an ordinance granting non-union city workers a 6-percent pay increase.
Council also will consider a proposal which allows city workers to accrue unused vacation time for up to three years - but not to take it out as cash on the first of the year.