Despite rash of layoffs, Trumbull patrol expands

July 23, 2010 at 12:08a.m.

By ED RUNYAN

WARREN

Over an 18-month period that saw the Warren Police Department reduce its ranks by a quarter of its officers and the Mahoning County Sheriff’s Department lay off 65 deputies, the Trumbull County sheriff’s office has expanded its road patrol by 33 percent.

The Trumbull County expansion increased the number of road deputies patrolling 12 northern townships from 12 to 16 in the past 15 months. Total employment by the sheriff’s office has risen by 10 in the past year — from 130 to 140.

Mahoning County, by comparison, has one deputy on road patrol full time in the rural areas, though it has about 16 others who are available to assist when they’re not transporting inmates or providing security to county courts in Boardman, Austintown, Canfield and Sebring. Deputies patrol Canfield Township at Canfield Township’s cost.

“I’d love to have that,” Lenny Sliwinski, commander of the Mahoning County sheriff’s office Headquarters Division, said of Trumbull’s patrol staff. “We’re just surviving, basically.” Sliwinski’s staffing levels have not changed in the past couple of years.

The number of calls for service for the Trumbull County sheriff’s office so far this year is 8,250, compared with 5,600 in Mahoning County.

Don Guarino, chief of operations for Trumbull Sheriff Tom Altiere, said officials in the 12 townships getting patrols didn’t come to the sheriff asking for additional deputies, though trustees generally prefer more.

“We saw what the needs are. We went to them,” Guarino said. Patrol officers were added after talking to their road-patrol supervisers, who said deputies were “constantly running from one call to another” because the calls for service had become “overwhelming,” Guarino said.

The four additional deputies work “power shifts,” meaning their shifts are targeted at times when the most crimes occur, such as Fridays and from 3 to 10 p.m. each day. The 12 other deputies are divided evenly among the three shifts each day.

Guarino and Ernie Cook, Altiere’s chief deputy, say the money to employ the additional road deputies was available in the sheriff’s budget because sheriff’s employees have been on a three-year wage freeze, several upper-level jobs in the department were left vacant and because of savings in jail operations by reducing the inmate population.

The cost of four additional road deputies — around $300,000 in salary and benefits per year — is less than the cost-cutting that has been done, so the department’s 2010 budget is the same as in 2009, Guarino said.

“We added [four] deputies to the road without costing a penny to the taxpayers,” he said.

Trumbull County Commissioner Paul Heltzel said the same conditions that led to the Warren and Mahoning County layoffs — the economy — are the reason Trumbull County is adding officers.

“When times are bad, people have to survive somehow, and the need for law enforcement goes up” to battle increased crime, Heltzel said.

County Auditor Adrian Biviano has said Trumbull County has weathered the economic downturn that began in late 2008 thanks to frugal spending policies, including wage freezes, and he projects a 2010 budget surplus of around $8 million to $10 million.

Trustee Bob Phillips of Gustavus Township said he has noticed the increase in deputies patrolling his rural township.

“We sure see them [deputies] a lot more than we used to,” said Phillips, a farmer, adding that he has often wondered where the county is getting the money to pay for them.

Donald Barzak, a Johnston Township trustee who runs an insurance business in Cortland, said he’s noticed an increase in deputies in Johnston over the past year or more.

“We’ve probably seen as many cruisers as when we had our own police department,” Barzak said of the force that was eliminated about two years ago.

Several men drinking coffee in Monty’s Carry Out and Restaurant in Mecca Township said crimes do occur in areas such as Mecca and Bloomfield townships, and they are happy to have deputies around.

“I think they’re highly visible,” said Mecca Township resident Dave Passek. “If [deputies] are sitting out here, they’re a lot closer than if they’re in downtown Warren” at the sheriff’s office.

Passek said he sees a deputy about 75 percent of the time as he drives home from his job in Solon at around midnight. That makes him feel that his home is better protected, he said.

Jim Schwartz of Bloomfield Township said he’s aware of several break-ins that have occurred near his home, one in which the homeowner got in his car and chased a thief from Bloomfield Township into Ashtabula County, where he blocked the man from getting away until police arrived.

Schwartz said the amount of coverage seems about right for the amount of crime.