Published: 08/24/2007
New chief faces budget problems By Kristen Grieco Staff writer
MANCHESTER - One month into his new position as police chief, Glenn McKiel is facing staffing issues that may put the Police Department over budget.
McKiel, who took over as chief July 23, said the budget crisis is due to the temporary loss of one full-time and two part-time officers. The full-time officer is on illness leave beginning this week, he said. According to Town Administrator Wayne Melville, one part-time officer was called for military duty in Iraq in June and will be gone at least a year. The other headed to the police academy in July.
"We've lost quite a bit of availability in terms of personnel," McKiel said. "It's our peak vacation season, our peak season for maintaining our personnel."
Coverage for the three, who work up to 120 hours per week combined, has been done by other members of the department working overtime, Melville said. McKiel said some of the part-time officers have been working additional hours to fill the gap. The town is also using out-of-town officers for detail work, Melville said.
"The budget's in trouble," Melville said. "We know with a certainty that we will never live within budget."
Neither McKiel nor Melville had an estimate of how much the Police Department might be over its budget.
According to Melville, in round numbers, a part-time officer makes about $15 per hour. A full-time officer working overtime will make about $30 per hour.
Manchester's fiscal year began July 1, and McKiel, who earns a $110,000 salary, said he was concerned that at this early stage, spending was outpacing the limits of the budget. There are typically three patrolmen working at all times, Melville said, and the town has not reduced that number in the face of the fiscal difficulties. "We haven't experienced a decrease in services, but it is costly," McKiel said.
The Police Department has a $1.2 million budget. It is staffed by 14 full-time officers, 10 part-time officers, two civilian dispatchers and an administrative assistant who will be starting in the coming weeks.
"The issue is compounded by the fact that we're a civil service community," Melville said. This means that all applicants for positions must pass Civil Service exams, and the town must wait to receive lists with the exam results before hiring officers.
According to the state Web site, the next applicable Civil Service exam will be administered Sept. 29. The town will then need to await the test results.
"My expectations of the chief have been dramatically altered," Melville said. "I expect him to find a way to put enough officers on the street to ensure public safety and to minimize the gap in the budget."
Yesterday, McKiel said, he delivered several proposals to shuffle shifts and finances in order to minimize the impact of the overtime. Both he and Melville declined to discuss the details.
"We may do something on a temporary basis," Melville said.
While budget issues are presenting an immediate challenge for McKiel in his first weeks on the job, he said he is focusing on the reason he came to Manchester in the first place: community police work. McKiel had been chief of police in Warren for five years before taking the job in Manchester.
"(Manchester is) a larger Police Department, it's a coastal department, which presents other opportunities. It's a lower-crime community, allowing our department to focus on community policing," McKiel said, comparing the town to Warren. "That's my brand of policing, my desire, my specialty."
Since beginning in Manchester, McKiel said he has spent time almost every day walking around in the community and met hundreds of residents. He also installed the department's first voice-mail system, which went in place Wednesday, so that residents can leave messages for the staff at any time.
"We're only as strong as our community support," McKiel said. "We're trying to be open, accessible and available."
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