PERRY TOWNSHIP–Township residents again expressed concern about a trustee-ordered drop in police hours and how it may affect their safety and the safety of their properties, with one woman suggesting they seek another tax levy if they need more money.

“I don’t think anybody in Perry Township would not support a levy,” Karen Taggart of West Perry Street said.

Taggart was one of several township residents who came to the meeting Monday night to talk about cuts to police hours and how it got to this point. Residents had also come to the previous meeting to ask some of the same questions. Pidgeon Road resident Butch Donnalley also said he was concerned about dropping hours when there are problems, such as the opioid epidemic and the rise in break-ins.

Trustee Chair Cliff Mix explained that the cut in hours is necessary so they can afford to place an officer on the Columbiana County Drug Task Force part-time. The plan is for a full-time officer to work 20 hours a week for the township and then work 20 hours a week for the DTF.

West Perry Street resident Linda Dickey asked about the township receiving $10,000 for putting someone on the DTF, which Mix said will be true but it’s not enough to cover all the officer’s salary and benefits, which the township would still have to cover.

“As of now, the chief hasn’t reduced any hours,” Trustee Jim Armeni said.

Chief Mike Emigh said it only took effect in November and that “we’ve reduced hours at the request of the trustees.”

Trustees haven’t taken any action yet to officially put an officer on the DTF, which is something Emigh thought was going to happen at the meeting. At the end of the meeting, he asked “what about the resolution for the Drug Task Force,” but nothing was done. He said it’s been three months since he asked for action to be taken. When asked why they hadn’t approved the officer move, Armeni said he can’t support bringing a person there if the hours aren’t being reduced.

When asked after the meeting why it’s just now coming up that there’s a problem in the police department, trustees said they started looking at how many hours were being paid out when they started talking about the DTF proposal, When asked why they hadn’t noticed it before, since they do sign everything, they said they didn’t know how many hours were being paid out, specifically to part-time officers.

For the last pay, Fiscal Officer Susan Johnston said 569 hours were paid out over a two-week period covering 14 days, 24 hours a day. For the department’s five full-time officers, the number of hours paid would total 400 for two weeks, so a large part of that extra was part-timers. The department has four part-time officers. Armeni said the chief agreed to reduce the hours for two weeks to 440 hours.

According to Emigh, the part-timers had been getting about 32 hours total per person. Now he’s reduced one down to eight hours and the others to roughly 24 hours. He said they still have 24/7 coverage with the way he’s scheduling the hours and splitting coverage.

Dickey and Maria Harrold, who lives at Andrew and West Perry, asked about the payroll and the budget and requested copies be brought to the next meeting, which Johnston said she would do. Harrold questioned where all the trustees live and whether they don’t see the crime issues the residents see. Armeni, who actually lives in the city, said the trustees have the same concerns and they work for the residents.

“We have a lot of issues going on within the police department,” he said, saying he didn’t realize they would end up having half a dozen executive sessions all dealing with the police department when he became a trustee in January. He said he couldn’t elaborate on some of the issues and said “I think we need to change the way we do business in the township.”

Trustees took no action on it, but Armeni said having an updated policy and procedures manual for the department would help. Emigh reported that he spoke with a Lexipol representative who said the company would put together a policy and procedures manual based on their needs which would include legal updates and mandatory training for officers at a cost of $2,385 per year after a $1,000 grant from their insurance carrier. This was at the suggestion of the prosecutor’s office.

Armeni said this could lead to a little more structure in the department, saying there are issues internally that they need to deal with. Emigh also referenced the outdated police manual that needs brought up to standards, saying it was discussed previously but never happened. This way he could enforce policy and procedures with officers related to any disciplinary matters or issues that come up.

Armeni thanked the residents for coming to the meeting to voice their concerns and said when the fiscal officer tells you to cut down, you do it. During the meeting, the trustees agreed to reduce the appropriations in the police department by $20,000 because there wasn’t going to be enough income in the department to cover it.

The police department relies on three levies for operations. There’s also a fourth levy split with the fire department, but it’s strictly for equipment and communications, not personnel costs. The department has four cruisers, with the last one purchased in 2017 and one on the way in 2019.

Johnston said the revenue for the police department from the three levies is $350,000 but the expenses will go beyond that. She said the police department has been supplemented by the general fund for years and for the most part they had been able to keep it going but both she and Mix said it’s getting harder to do. Fine money goes into the general fund and had been used to cover the department’s fuel costs but it’s no longer keeping up. Health insurance has come out of the township’s general fund in the past and so has the chief’s salary. With cuts in state funding and property taxes down.

The trustees didn’t talk about the new levy idea, but when asked, Mix said “I think it’s inevitable,” saying it’s something they’re going to have to put on sometime.

The next township meeting is 6:30 p.m. Nov. 26. There’s a meeting with employees at 11 a.m. Friday to discuss insurance.