By CARL E. FEATHER - Staff Writer - cfeather@starbeacon.com
Today will be the last day of work for 27 Ashtabula County Sheriff’s Department employees who have been laid off as a result of the county’s dire financial crisis.
Sheriff William Johnson sent five-day notices to the unions Friday in anticipation of having his budget slashed by 20 percent. The Ashtabula County Board of Commissioners, in a work session Monday, tentatively committed $4 million to the sheriff this year.
Johnson said that, effective Wednesday, there will be just one car, manned by two deputies, available to cover 27 townships and 720 square miles. The car will be based in Jefferson. For some areas of the county, it could be a wait of up to 45 minutes just for the deputy to arrive.
With the threat of the siren wailing in the distance removed from the equation, Johnson warned that an Old West kind of lawlessness could develop. Priority will be given to calls of crimes in progress.
“In progress serious (calls), we are going to respond,” Johnson said, explaining the scope of the department’s road operation after today.
Examples would be a domestic disturbance, assault, suicide or burglary in progress, but Johnson said citizens who call in a burglary, civil dispute or simple assault after the fact will be put on a waiting list. He said it could take a couple of days or longer to have a report made, or the caller may be asked to come into the department to file the report.
“When we get to it, we get to it,” Johnson said.
The sheriff cut 16 road deputies, eight corrections officers, two dispatchers and one evidence person in order to reduce his spending by $1 million from last year’s levels. He said the affected employees will be paid for their time worked in the current pay period, then be paid off on their accrued benefit time in the next pay. Because the county is self-insured on its unemployment, a large chunk of Johnson’s budget will have to go to pay those benefits.
He said once the claims are filed and he sees the exact numbers from the commissioners, he will tweak staffing further to bring his costs in line with the money commissioners give him.
Originally, the sheriff said 30 staff members would have to go at the $4 million mark; however, by making some reductions in operations costs, he was able to salvage three of those positions. One of them is in the civil office, resulting in no layoffs in that department. He salvaged one road deputy position, who will float between shifts to fill in for vacationing or ill deputies. The third will be a corrections officer, who will fill a similar floating position.
The sheriff salvaged two floors of the jail, the county’s only full-time jail, in order to retain the federal prisoner revenue, about $500,000 annually. In addition, Johnson will be able to house the most violent felons. He said the jail’s census will be around 35 at the staffing level he budgeted.
However, the sheriff predicted there will be significantly fewer arrests in the county as a result of the reduced road-patrol staff. Typically, the department makes about eight arrests every 24 hours.
“What’s really going to have an impact are the courts, the number of cases they handle,” he said. “We’re going to have a lot less arrests … we don’t have as many people out there. Less people, less arrests.”
Johnson said he did the best he could with the money commissioners gave him. He has numerous statutory requirements that must be met, including serving papers and transporting prisoners; therefore, the daytime staff will be significantly larger than the evening and night staffs. Those deputies will not be used to answer 911 calls because they will be involved in transport and serving papers. Even Johnson plans to go on the road.
The sheriff said he won’t send just one deputy out on a call when there is only one car on the road and no backup is available.
“That’s an accident waiting to happen,” he said.
With a staff of only 50, Johnson’s department is less than half the size it was when he took office nearly 20 years ago.
