CITY COUNCIL AGENDA ITEM
ACTION REQUESTED:
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Authorize the City Manager to approve the Police Department’s request to increase the CY18 headcount by one FTE to hire an additional Community Service Officer (CSO) position
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DEPARTMENT: Police Department
SUBMITTED BY: Robert W. Marshall, Chief of Police
BOARD/COMMISSION REVIEW:
NA
BACKGROUND:
Community Service Officers (CSOs) respond to over 8,200 calls per year. Currently, the Police Department has nine CSO positions. Four CSOs are funded through either the Burlington Fund or Downtown SSA and are assigned to parking enforcement. The remaining five CSOs are funded through the General Fund.
CSOs respond to calls for service which otherwise would be handled by patrol beat officers including parking enforcement, private property crash reports, traffic direction, lock outs, motorist assists, and transports. The most cost-effective use of our personnel is to assign these tasks to CSOs so Police Officers focus on preventative patrol, address criminal calls for service, and self-initiated enforcement efforts.
DISCUSSION:
Of the nine CSO positions, four CSOs (funded by the Burlington Fund or Downtown SSA) are assigned in either the downtown or at the train stations. These CSOs are primarily involved in parking and traffic enforcement.
Of the remaining five CSOs (funded through the General Fund), two are assigned to night shift from 5:30 p.m. to 5:30 a.m., one on Shift A nights and the other on Shift B nights. The third CSO works Monday through Friday from 3-11 p.m. with the first two hours daily focused on Washington Street parking.
The fourth CSO is responsible for transmittal of court documents, bail bonds, warrants and other documents to Will and DuPage Counties daily (these documents currently cannot be transmitted electronically) resulting in only being available for part of their shift for other CSO duties. The fifth CSO works Shift A days from 5:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. supporting the Police Officers on that shift. The Shift B day CSO position was eliminated during the 2018 budget workshops resulting in no CSO currently assigned to Shift B days to support the officers.
CSOs have handled 2,757 calls for service thus far in 2018 including accidents on private property, abandoned vehicles, lockouts, motorist assists, vehicle services, and administrative transmittals. Sixty-nine percent of these calls were assigned between 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. which is our high activity period. Currently, with no dedicated CSO on Shift B days, these calls for service are being completed by patrol and traffic officers. The reinstatement of this position will allow officers to be more efficient with the use of their time handling emergency calls, proactive enforcement, increasing visibility in neighborhoods and crime prevention. This position will help achieve our objective to continue our high level of service to the public in the most cost-effective manner.
FISCAL IMPACT:
The proposed position would result in an annual increase of $69,000. Due to the high vacancy level within the Police department, the cost of the CSO position will be managed within the 2018 Police department budget.