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DPS to hire more piggies
Arizona Department of Public Safety hiring officers again Police agency still faces staffing gaps by JJ Hensley - Jun. 22, 2012 10:22 PM The Republic | azcentral.com The Arizona Department of Public Safety has felt the brunt of state budget cuts as much as any state agency, losing hundreds of officers in the past four years without having the funds to replace them and leaving some portions of the agency's vast coverage area staffed at 50 percent of recommended levels. The agency will begin chipping away at that deficit next month when it begins accepting applications for 20 new officers who will be stationed in remote areas of the state. Another 20 officers will go through the academy early next year. For an agency that is down 253 patrol officers and sergeants, and which formerly put 120 officers through the training academy each year, those 40 hires are probably more symbolic than significant in ending the shortage, but their impact will be felt around the state, said Lt. Col. Dennis Young, the agency's deputy director. "Law enforcement in Arizona, we're very dependent on each other and we have very good working relationships with all our partner agencies, but there are parts in the state where we really have to rely on other agencies," Young said. "In the last year or so they've started asking, 'When you are going to start hiring? When are we going to get some relief in this county with DPS officers?' They have responsibilities in their community, and they're having to assist us more than they have in the past, so they're wondering when we're going to start hiring, too." The agency was able to begin hiring new officers after the Legislature approved a $9.2 million budget increase for DPS this year. It was intended to help offset increasing employee-related costs and to hire employees throughout the agency. A helicopter mechanic is among the other priorities, said Lt. Col. James McGuffin, who commands the Highway Patrol, because staffing shortages are agencywide. The shortages are also beginning to show up in some of the agency's law-enforcement statistics, he said. "We will respond to every call for service that comes into the Department of Public Safety," he said. "But what falls out of that picture when you have fewer officers is the self-initiated activity, the law-enforcement action to find DUIs, to deal with speeding or reckless drivers, because the officer is more tied up with calls for service." From 2010 through 2011, McGuffin said, the agency recorded decreases of: • 15 to16 percent in DUI arrests. • 11 percent in other arrests. • 6.5 percent in citations. • 8 percent in traffic stops. The lingering knowledge that backup for an officer might be many miles away can cause officers to change their behavior in ways that never show up in statistics, said Sgt. John Ortelano, president of a DPS labor group and supervisor of a squad near Buckeye that is at 50 percent of recommended levels. "It leaves the officer to learn to do their job very well, hopefully, and be very self-sufficient," he said. "It also has a tendency to cause them to be very cognizant that there's certain things they're not going to get themselves into. They're not going to stop doing their job, but the proactiveness to get involved in some sticky situations will be greatly diminished because an officer knows there are no resources to come assist." The officers DPS hires in the next year will go through nearly 30 weeks of training between the academy and courses the agency offers. That is followed by a 10-week field-training program, making it at least eight months before they hit the road in areas from Wikieup to Sierra Vista. "Realistically, I would think that DPS would have to hire 100 people a year for the next probably four years before we get to a staffing level where we need to be," Ortelano said. "Hopefully, we've finally reached the point where we're not going to continue to be losing large numbers of people with no end in sight." Any additional help will be a boon in communities such as Thatcher, a town of about 5,000 at the base of Mount Graham near the New Mexico border. The state's jurisdiction in the town is small -- extending along the part of U.S. 70 that runs through Thatcher, said Thatcher Police Chief Mark Stevens. But his agency has come to rely on DPS' assistance, and will eventually benefit from the new officers. He has just one detective on the 11-man police force, which he took over five years ago after more than 20 years as a Mesa police officer. "We relied on them a lot for our drug interdiction and other investigations that are too complex for a small agency like ours,'' Stevens said. |