Public Safety Reports

As Chairman of the Public Safety Committee, one of the things I do is submit reports to the full County Board on the activities of the Public Safety Committee.  Below are the reports I have submitted for the past two months:

October

Mutual Aid Requests---Sheriff’s Department 

The key item that was discussed at this month’s County Board meeting involved the Sheriff’s department providing aid to other municipalities within our County, as well as outside of our County, to assist with civil disturbances.  

Within our County, there have been several mostly peaceful protests, marches, and demonstrations in Municipalities including Germantown, Hartford, West Bend, and Slinger. Sheriff’s deputies assisted in providing a law enforcement presence in these communities to ensure that these protests, marches, and demonstrations remained peaceful. The sheriff’s department also provided substantial assistance to one municipality, Germantown, to prevent disorderly protesting. Sheriff Schulteis is committed to providing aid to any Municipality in Washington County to prevent mostly-peaceful protesting from evolving into violent or unlawful activities. 

Washington County Sheriff’s deputies were also utilized to help with civil disturbances in Kenosha and Milwaukee. Both cities are part of our emergency response region. As such, counties and municipalities in this region are committed to aiding each other when necessary. The aid we rendered helps to ensure that, should it ever be needed, those communities would render aid to us. 

There was some discussion about rendering aid when the community restricts the response of law enforcement in a way that prevents the use of proper crowd control measures, such as using tear gas. Sheriff Schulteis did not send any deputies to assist with crowd control during the Democratic National Convention because the the prohibition on the use of tear gas. The consensus of the committee confirmed the Sheriff’s decision that we should not engage in mutual aid requests if law enforcement is not able to use tear gas if needed. This is an effective and appropriate measure to deal with individuals unruly crowds. 

If Washington County would see significant protest or civil disobedience, it would be critically important for all municipalities within our County to very quickly mobilize and join the Washington County Sheriff’s Department in rendering mutual aid. Our municipal police departments have typically worked well together.

Grant---Sheriff’s Department 

After the Public Safety meeting, the Sheriff sent this information:  

“I did not know this yesterday, but I wanted to let you know we were awarded a 49K non-matching grant that we applied for from the state. Preference was given to multi-jurisdictional drug units that were attempting to foster collaboration between agencies. 

I had been working with the new Hartford Police chief to get a Hartford officer into our drug unit as they have not had representation in decades. The strategy worked. We are going to be able to purchase a new vehicle, radio and work station for the Hartford officer here at the SO without affecting our budget.”

August

Civil Service Commission 

The committee voted unanimously to forward an ordinance change to the full county board that would dissolve the civil service commission. We believe this would reduce dead time in the hiring process, and enable us to proceed through all the same steps while reducing the hiring timeline. Currently it takes between 16 and 24 weeks to hire someone, while removing the civil service commission would reduce the hiring time down to 8-11 weeks, saving anywhere from 5-16 weeks in time to hire a new deputy. The streamlined process would be faster and more flexible, and it would enable us to add in additional screening options, such as an assessment center, without lengthening the time. We are looking to add an assessment center (with an additional interview conducted by an external agency) to the hiring process. We are really “late to the party” on this, as a lot of other counties and municipalities have already made this change. We are in the minority of Counties that still have a civil service commission.

 I met 3 of the 4 current members of the civil service commission. They are all great, dedicated people who care about our community and want to make sure we hire quality deputies. I ask the board to join me in thanking them for their service to the commission. We can keep them involved in the hiring process without the civil service commission. This change is really more of a procedural change that moves our hiring process into the 21st century and positions us to more proactively and efficiently recruit and hire the talent we need. 

Swat Team

Our committee approved spending $15,000 on swat team equipment. We will invite 3 police officers from municipal agencies to join the county’s swat team. This will expand the capabilities of our swat team, and improve inter-agency cooperation & coordination. The county will not incur any personnel cost related to this, just the $15,000 equipment cost.