TALENT, Ore. — The Talent Police Chief announced at a city council study session Tuesday night, the department is cutting back on hours.
Talent Police Chief Tim Doney announced officer shortages are forcing the department to decrease patrol hours to 20 hours a day, starting Monday.
“The longevity of patrol officers in smaller towns in our region is, it’s not something that we have someone that stays around often for a career,” Chief Doney said.
At Wednesday night’s study session, he said of the four patrol-ready officers in the city, two of them currently have applications being processed at other agencies.
“We have a lot of interest in recruits that want to join the department, but what happens with them is they come in and they face about a 12 month long period where they’re not able to go out on solo patrols,” Sandra Spelliscy, Talent City Manager, said.
Spelliscy says the city has always had issues hiring officers with prior experience due to a lack of competitive pay and advancement opportunities.
“We did just recently hire a recruit, but it’s going to be about a year before he’s actually able to be a full on patrol officer,” Spelliscy said.
Chief Doney said it’s more than just pay that has officers looking elsewhere.
“Moral issues resulting from employees’ perceptions from a lack of support from elected leaders and postings recently on social media,” Chief Doney said.
The announcement comes a couple weeks after City Councilor Emily Berlant shared a post about police brutality to her personal Facebook. It was then ‘liked’ by Talent Mayor Darby Ayers-Flood. The two were confronted by former Talent Police Chief Curtis Whipple at a council meeting this month. Chief Doney said Wednesday it’s all effecting his team.
“In all honesty, social media is killing us. Social media is killing us and leadership making comments is killing morale,” Chief Doney said.
A letter written to the mayor and the Talent City Council by several city employees, is calling for the resignation of the mayor and Councilor Berlant. The letter says, “What you fail to realize is we are not losing our police staff due to lack of funding, that has been the narrative for years. We are losing police staff due to your complete lack of respect and the lack of support from members of this council.”
The letter is signed by ten talent city employees.
“There’s a lot of things going on in the world today but we are a part of the community,” Chief Doney said.
The mayor and Councilor Berlant both apologized during Wednesday’s meeting for any perceived lack of support for the Talent Police Department itself. Berlant previously apologized personally to Chief Doney.
“I want employees of talent pd to be guardians, not warriors,” Chief Doney said.
Despite limiting patrol hours, Chief Doney says that does not mean 911 calls will go unanswered. If the City of Talent can’t respond to a call, the city has a mutual aid agreement with Ashland, Phoenix and the Jackson County Sheriff’s Office, who will help out.
The Talent City Council will continue to discuss the financial situation for the police force at its next meeting.
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