Allegan County has clarified the roles of sheriff deputies who have been contracted by local municipalities throughout the county.
Commissioners discussed the changes to the contract language at their planning meeting, Thursday, Feb. 8, coinciding with the day Saugatuck city council members heard a recommendation from an advisory group to switch from its partnership with Douglas for police to contracting for sheriff deputies.
Allegan County Administrator Rob Sarro said the modifications were included in the draft discussed with Saugatuck officials and that the contract is firmly rooted in the original.
“This is just further explaining it,” Sarro said, “so an agency really understands what they’re contracting for.”
The major points of the arrangements have not changed. Allegan County pays 25 percent of the approximately $102,000 cost for each deputy position under contract. The contracting municipality then pays the remainder.
“We want to make sure (they) know (they)’re entering into a cost-sharing agreement for a position, Sarro said. “It’s a position that really is on average a 14-day tour of duty that averages 84 hours.”
New language emphasizes that some of those 84 hours inevitably find the deputy off patrol for a variety of reasons. Those include: paid time off, holidays, other leaves, training, attending meetings, and court appearances.
Further, Sarro said new language will explicitly spell out that “the county and sheriff are not responsible for providing personnel to backfill services during those times of leave unless they... contract for additional hours.
“It’s the way it has always worked... we’re just taking it to the next level.”
The contract language will also reflect that the county’s portion of the contract shall be considered a component of countywide road patrol.
In theory, the sheriff office divvies up the county into five road patrol sections. In practice, however, available staff time forces them to divide up the county only three ways, increasing the square miles each of three deputies and one roving unit cover.
Allegan County Sheriff Frank Baker said, “Yes, we are often without enough cars to cover each of the patrol areas. In that event we shift cars around or leave areas uncovered.”
He said discussions with Saugatuck officials on the possibly contracting for services have forced the department to analyze how it would handle each shift.
“We will have to consider if there is a contract deputy on duty or not within Saugatuck when the shift sergeant is making assignments,” Baker said. “It may require a coordinated effort with the state police to make sure cars are assigned appropriately.”
The contract explains that roughly a quarter of the time of each deputy contract is expected to be spent responding to calls—emergency or otherwise—outside the jurisdiction funding the other three-quarters of the contract.
Along those lines, the nature of the calls outside the contracted area do not dictate whether or not the deputy can be called away from the area.
Sarro said, “(The contract) used to say it was only for priority calls. Entities should expect that position will respond—it shall respond—to calls in the county outside that geographic area. It doesn’t matter if they’re a priority 1 or 3. They should expect that 25 percent of the time, that is a general patrol vehicle.
“We’re just being transparent saying, look, your 75 percent is what we’re saying that on average you’re going to get in addition to whatever the county’s going to otherwise provide. But our 25 percent is not a grant... (it’s) considered part of countywide patrol.”
The report from Saugatuck’s Police Services Advisory Working Group appears to account primarily only for a five-section patrol, acknowledging only “there are times deputies may cover multiple sections if there are not a total of five section deputies working.”
Baker said he didn’t have the statistics readily available to say how often the department was on three-section patrol.
“The schedule we have been working on as part of questions from Saugatuck captures the times of day most likely to receive a call for service—taking into account seasonal trends, call volume, and officer safety,” he said. “Additionally, there has been a proposed budget to provide overtime to backfill positions during times of personal time off or need for additional staffing. We have also asked that Saugatuck budget for additional hours by reserve deputies.”
Sarro noted the county no longer includes $10,000 in administrative fees as part of the contracts.
County Commissioner Tom Jessup said, “I always interpreted (the contract) as, and others did too, an enhancement to the county services. We’re changing the narrative here just a little bit.”
Undersheriff Mike Larsen said tracking deputies’ exact time doing either local or countywide work would be a management nightmare.
“Instead, we have many years of history that say it’s a fact that the officer is going to be called outside of the (contract area), and so the county has a benefit they’re paying for,” Larsen said. “We’ve never lost a contract because (the contracting entity) felt the car wasn’t in the area enough, though we have had some public complaints filed.”
Baker recalled the contracts originally said the deputies would only respond outside their area to a “life or death” emergency. He said the language has been updated several times to its current form over the years.
In noting the contributions of the local contracts, he said the eight positions effectively comprise a third of the county’s road patrol efforts, not counting supervision.
“We feel there’s a benefit to the county,” Baker said. “It helps them with the cost-sharing and it helps us because they’re available part of time to come out and assist us... It seems to be working and we don’t have to micromanage it by the minute.
“We occasionally go through and look at call volume. Most recently on the strip (between Otsego and Plainwell)... the Gun Plain deputy was for awhile out on the strip handling just as many Otsego township as he was Gun Plain Township. And that was a concern, because we’re afraid of losing the contract if they’re subsidizing the cost of another township.
“So we flat out ordered that deputy to not go out there and take those calls. Because they want to help. And we’ve been able to manage his call volume to that 75 percent of calls in his township.”
Contact Ryan Lewis at rmlewis@allegannews.com or (269) 673-5534.
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