By Samantha Phillips

sphillips@vindy.com

HUBBARD

The township made some recent changes with the police department to try to lessen the department’s financial burden.

After a police levy failed last year, the township struggled for months to figure out how to avoid the department going into a deficit. Voters approved a levy in the spring, but the money won’t be collected until April 2020.

The changes were made at a regular meeting last week.

Originally, the trustees were going to idle the part-time officers, which would allow them to keep their commission. In return, they would have to volunteer 16 hours per week. Police Chief Todd Coonce recommended against that move, however.

Since then, a full-time officer left for another department, and the part-time officers will cover those shifts.

“My big concern when they put that order out is that we have some good, dedicated partners, and they would have been looking for work elsewhere because it was income for them. They’ve all been notified that they won’t be idled at this time,” Coonce said.

The no-overtime rule will still be enforced. Coonce said there could be a delay in response times due to staffing and financial shortages.

“Anytime you have cutbacks on equipment or personnel, there will be safety concerns,” Coonce said. “Our first priority is officer safety, and we will make sure we maintain service to the people of our township.”

Mutual aid from other jurisdictions has been helpful, but they have their own communities to police, he added.

Among other changes, township officers can’t drive their patrol cars to and from work unless they live within a 5-mile radius.

A township officer also was removed from Trumbull Action Group, a multijurisdictional task force, and the Trumbull County Sheriff Office’s detective bureau to be put back on duty in the township.

The department is transitioning to a cloud-based storage system for body-camera footage to save money.