Unfilled positions are keeping police officers off the
streets
It’s hard to understand why the Gilroy Police Department records technician staffing situation was allowed to get this bad.
These are good-paying desk jobs, with an entry-level technician earning more than $40,000 a year.
Applicants need some computer savvy and must be able to pass a background check.
The police department, other agencies, and the residents of Gilroy are experiencing the domino effect of having only half of the records technicians budgeted by the city in place. The city has five full-time and one part-time records technicians on staff, but five full-time positions have gone unfilled for more than six months.
Within the police department, officers are forced to handle more paperwork. Police union president Jim Callahan told reporter Emily Alpert that officers are “… spending a lot more time in the office.”
Wonderful – officers who are pushing papers aren’t patrolling our streets.
In addition, sworn police officers are overpaid – by a lot – for paperwork duties. It makes much more sense, from both a fiscal and a public safety perspective, for police officers to concentrate on duties that require presence, a gun and a badge.
The understaffing crisis also creates additional stress for the records technicians who are working in the Gilroy Police Department. They’re constantly interrupted from their records processing duties by walk-in customers, not only adding stress, but reducing efficiency.
“If we had the staffing levels, we’d have someone at the front counter constantly,” records supervisor David Boles said.
Great, after you climb the steps of the new $29 million pyramid department building there’s nobody at the front counter.
Other police agencies rely on Gilroy records technicians to respond to warrant searches within 10 minutes. If they don’t, rules barring unreasonable detention of suspects force other agencies to release people who they think might have outstanding warrants.
All of those problems culminate in poor service to the Gilroy residents. Police patrols are reduced, service at the walk-in counter is slower, records technician efficiency is degraded, and public safety is compromised when suspects with outstanding warrants must be released.
In addition to the obvious solution – hiring qualified records technicians – the City Council should ask the city manager to report on why the records technician positions have been allowed to remain unfilled for months.
City Council did its job by funding positions that the police department needs to work effectively on taxpayers’ behalf. Now it needs to know why the budgeted positions were not filled for so long and who is responsible so that Gilroyans don’t have to continue to suffer the consequences.
