Small-staffed shift at Warren police

By Ed Runyan

The administration had decided to eliminate the six-officer minimum.

WARREN — With a deficit of $1.5 million looming over the city, new measures need to be taken to avoid police and fire department overtime.

Cutting back to two police officers on the day shift on Sunday, however, was not an acceptable measure, said William “Doug” Franklin, Warren’s safety-service director.

Franklin had a meeting with Police Chief John Mandopoulos and other ranking officers in the police department a couple of weeks ago and established some new staffing policies regarding overtime that involve contacting Franklin whenever staffing levels drop to low levels, Franklin said.

That meeting became necessary because the budget for police overtime had run dry, Franklin said.

Among the policies are contacting Franklin so each situation can be examined and a workable solution found, he said.

But on Sunday, when four of six assigned officers called off several hours before their shift, the department was left with just two officers to patrol the city in one car.

“That situation should not occur again,” Franklin said, regardless of the city’s budgetary problems.

Franklin said he believes the problem will be handled better if it arises again, but having four officers call off sick for the same shift is an unusual situation.

In the situation Sunday, Franklin did not receive a phone call about the problem, perhaps because he was just coming off vacation, he said, though he had a cell phone with him that could have been called.

If he had received a phone call, Franklin said, he’s not sure what action he would have taken.

His actions would have ranged from calling in officers, to calling for assistance from other departments to Franklin’s monitoring police radio traffic himself so that manpower decisions could be made as they arose.

Mandopoulos, however, said so many situations can arise on a day-to-day basis, he’s not sure anything can be done to prevent small-staffed shifts from occurring again.

He added that the administration’s decision three weeks ago to eliminate the minimum staffing requirement of six officers per shift is what set the current situation into motion.

Mandopoulos said he called Franklin regarding the Sunday staffing situation but only as a “courtesy call.”

runyan@vindy.com