Overtime mounts at Public Safety Facility
NORWICH – The amount of overtime paid out to public safety employees and corrections officers each year continues to exceed the amount budgeted, and at least one county supervisor is calling for better planning in the future.
“It seems like we have some consistency adding on (to the budget for overtime each year). Maybe we should look more closely at what we need up front,” said Preston Supervisor Peter C. Flanagan at a meeting of the board of supervisors last week.
The board adopted legislation in November and December that transfered more than $100,000 within the Sheriff’s budget to cover part time officers, overtime and medical expenses. Less than $400,000 was budgeted for overtime for the entire year.
Guilford Supervisor George Seneck has also questioned whether the department is budgeting accurately, and said he was waiting for the sheriff to report back to him with the total amount paid out in overtime and benefits so far this year. Seneck, who has been educating himself on county government by attending nearly every committee meeting this past year – in hopes of making a run for board chairman – said back in the spring that using overtime and part-time people to fill in on a regular basis after their own shifts “is not good for safety.”
Sheriff Ernest Cutting often explains that he tries to keep 58 corrections officers on staff full-time at the now five-year-old facility, but must turn to extra hire and overtime to fulfill New York State Department of Corrections’ mandates that stipulate 64 officers for the county’s 129-bed jail. And this year, he said, full-time staff were plagued with illness, retirement and military obligations.
Two additional “extra hire” positions added to the jail’s budget in 2011 didn’t solve the overtime problem as planned,. “We are way over,” Finance Committee Vice Chairman Dennis Brown, D-Pharsalia, confirmed last Monday.
The jail can house a total of 133 prisoners. To cut some operations costs, a pod containing 20 cells may be shut down. Staff levels must remain the same, however, as mandated by the state.
“It seems like we have some consistency adding on (to the budget for overtime each year). Maybe we should look more closely at what we need up front,” said Preston Supervisor Peter C. Flanagan at a meeting of the board of supervisors last week.
The board adopted legislation in November and December that transfered more than $100,000 within the Sheriff’s budget to cover part time officers, overtime and medical expenses. Less than $400,000 was budgeted for overtime for the entire year.
Guilford Supervisor George Seneck has also questioned whether the department is budgeting accurately, and said he was waiting for the sheriff to report back to him with the total amount paid out in overtime and benefits so far this year. Seneck, who has been educating himself on county government by attending nearly every committee meeting this past year – in hopes of making a run for board chairman – said back in the spring that using overtime and part-time people to fill in on a regular basis after their own shifts “is not good for safety.”
Sheriff Ernest Cutting often explains that he tries to keep 58 corrections officers on staff full-time at the now five-year-old facility, but must turn to extra hire and overtime to fulfill New York State Department of Corrections’ mandates that stipulate 64 officers for the county’s 129-bed jail. And this year, he said, full-time staff were plagued with illness, retirement and military obligations.
Two additional “extra hire” positions added to the jail’s budget in 2011 didn’t solve the overtime problem as planned,. “We are way over,” Finance Committee Vice Chairman Dennis Brown, D-Pharsalia, confirmed last Monday.
The jail can house a total of 133 prisoners. To cut some operations costs, a pod containing 20 cells may be shut down. Staff levels must remain the same, however, as mandated by the state.
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