Boardman trustees swear in three police officers

Staff report

BOARDMAN

Township trustees on Monday swore in three police patrolmen.

The entry-level officers joining the township police department are Nicholas Asimakopoulos, Michael Manis and Matthew Straniak. A fourth new hire will be sworn in at a later time.

All four, Police Chief Jack Nichols noted, are military veterans.

“I think that really shows the township’s support of the veteran community,” he told the board of trustees. “A lot of these guys are coming back and having trouble finding employment. I think it’s a credit to them, and to the township” that the township hired them.

Nichols also highlighted that the new hires bring the department’s staffing back up to a level – now 63 police officers – that it hasn’t had since before 2008.

“The numbers are back, so it’s a good thing,” Nichols said, noting that this round of hiring fulfills a promise made prior to the 2011 passage of a police levy that the department would use those funds to hire additional officers.

Two of the new patrolmen were hired using grant funds from the Department of Justice’s Community Oriented Policing Services Office, which helps law-enforcement agencies hire more community-policing officers.

Under the terms of the township’s contract with the Ohio Patrolmen’s Benevolent Association, entry-level patrol officers start at an hourly wage rate of $16.93, or $35,221 per year.

In other business, the board of trustees adopted nuisance resolutions for an abandoned property at 4796 Lockwood Blvd. Those resolutions will allow the township to secure the structure and remove rubbish and debris from the property.