Union County Sheriff Jamie Patton said the department’s new contract may be a “game-changer” for staffing issues at the agency.
After spending the better part of the last year or more traveling the state in search of new recruits, Patton said this new agreement should help the sheriff’s office be competitive with neighboring agencies and also, hopefully, retain deputies at the sheriff’s office.
“A few weeks ago I met with the county commissioners because this was specific to salaries and dealing with budgets. I proposed a solution to our hemorrhaging and our massive bleed at the sheriff’s office with staffing conditions,” he said. “I’m excited and I think this will be a game-changer.”
Patton said the new proposal will bring base salaries up to match those at the Marysville Division of Police as the office has recently lost five deputies to the city agency alone. Deputies have also gone to other agencies in the central Ohio region, but Marysville is a top competitor.
The existing contract stipulated that sheriff’s deputies would receive a 10% pay increase for 2023, a 3% increase in 2024 and a 3% increase in 2025. The contracts are set for a three-year period.
“Now, with the new proposal, to match Marysville, the deputies will get their original 3% plus 5.5% in ’24 for a total of 8.5%,” he said. “In ’25, they’ll get their original 3% from the original contract plus 6.1% for a total of a 9.1% total increase.”
The new numbers will take effect on Jan. 1 next year and was made possible with the passage of the 2024 county budget last month, which included an increase to the sheriff’s office budget from $9.4 million to $10.6 million.
Patton said previously that the office had trouble getting and retaining deputies for a variety of reasons, ranging from a diminishing interest in law enforcement to financial considerations. The office had half a dozen open positions in the summer of 2022 and has almost doubled that number in the last year.
Lately, he said, the primary concern coming from people interested in coming to the sheriff’s office is the high cost of living.
“Especially in today’s market, where housing is challenging, interest rates are higher,” Patton said. “The common theme that we’ve currently heard is ‘what you have shared about your agency is really interesting and we’d explore it more but right now we can’t.’”
He said unless the potential recruit is looking for an apartment, which may be an easier financial decision for some, those looking for houses said the transition isn’t feasible. The sheriff’s office also stipulates that deputies have to either live in the county or in an adjacent county.
The longer distance drive can be a deterrent for potential recruits, he added, as well as not being able to live in the community they serve.
Patton said while he’s looking forward to the opportunities this new contract will provide, it doesn’t come without a sacrifice.
“Because of the dollars we’re talking about, with the 10 open positions I have currently, to make this work with these increases, I had to give up six positions,” he said. “In ’24, I’m approved to hire four with the understanding, the commissioners said the door is open to come back and discuss additional positions, once I get those four hired.”
He said he’s okay with the staggered approach, as the process to hire 10 hasn’t really panned out.
“It’ll probably take us into mid-year, close to our budget discussions in October of ’24, to get the four that are in the academy on the road and then getting the four new positions hired, that’s going to be a task in itself,” Patton said. “We’ll get through it, we can survive. We’re surviving now but we’re doing it with a lot of extra time by the current staff we have.”
He said offering relief to his current staff, who has stepped up repeatedly to fill the gaps, is reason enough to be happy this proposal was approved.
“I feel the stress of the employees that are mandated to work overtime and forced to work mandated shifts to pick up the slack of us being down on staffing,” Patton said. “And it doesn’t help morale and it doesn’t help our folks.”
Overall, Patton said, this is some of the better news his office has had in a while.
“I really do think it will change the game for us and I think we’ll be able to recruit more. And folks that are working at other agencies may look at this as an ability to help their family because they’re potentially going to make more than those working to the east or north of us,” he said. “And I can’t say enough about the commissioners being willing to work with me to get this initiative to where it is right now. We still have a lot of work to do and we’ll work hard at getting it done. Now, at least we can see the light at the end of the tunnel.”