Submitted by Darren Smith, Guest Blogger
A worrisome situation has been created in a rural Josephine County Oregon. Approximately seventy percent of the land area in the county is owned by the federal government which provided millions in revenue from timber subsidies. That source of finding for the county stopped due to a termination of payments by the federal government and in an attempt to fill a budget shortfall of over $7,500,000 the county asked the voters to fund a tax levy. The levy, which was projected to assess $300 on a $200,000 home was defeated in a narrow election. The result of the loss of both revenue sources caused a routing of the sheriff’s office budget, personnel and services.
The effect of this has led to cuts in services and patrol that has effectively led to a major transfer of the traditional roles of county policing from local government to irregular citizen’s patrols and the farming out of what little remains in the sheriff’s office to private contractors and outside agencies. Could situations like this resurrect some of the nineteenth century practices necessary in the West that are no longer compatible with twenty first century American Society?
Josephine County is in Southwest Oregon having Grants Pass as the county seat, has a population of 83,000 and encompasses 1,542 square miles. The sheriff’s office is administered by elected sheriff Gil Gilbertson.
In May of 2012 in a press release authorized by Sheriff Gilbertson the agency undertook drastic cuts in personnel and services provided. In that press release the following actions were to be taken:
- The sheriff’s Major Crimes Unit will cease operations. Current, open criminal cases have been referred to the District Attorney’s Office, but there will be no further investigative follow-up done by sheriff’s detectives.
- The Records Division, which fields non-emergency phone calls and completes many state-required functions, will close. Non-emergency reports may be submitted by citizens online… but the reports will simply be logged for information. There will not be any deputy follow-up or investigation.
- The Civil Division will be reducing its hours to Tuesday through Friday, 1 to 4 p.m.
- Patrol services will decrease from 20 hours a day, 7 days a week to 8 hours a day, 5 days a week. The total number of patrol personnel will decrease from 24.5 to 6. Of the remaining six, one is a sergeant and three are contracted by other entities.
- Contract deputies’ primary responsibilities are to those entities that pay their salaries – namely, the City of Cave Junction, the Bureau of Land Management and the Oregon State Marine Board. Therefore, their availability to respond to areas outside their contracts will be extremely limited.
- Considering the quantity of high priority calls that this office receives, it is clear that patrol will only be able to respond to life threatening incidents.
- Sheriff’s deputies will respond to life threatening calls only during patrol hours of operation, which are not being publicized for safety reasons. There are no funds available for call outs, so sheriff’s deputies will not be available to respond after hours.
- 911 calls after hours, and if it is a life threatening situation, Oregon State Police will provide a limited response that involves eliminating the current threat.
- Sheriff’s patrol deputies will be spread thin, and their response, even in life threatening situations, may be delayed.
- As such, the Sheriff’s Office regretfully advises that, if you know you are in a potentially volatile situation (for example, you are a protected person in a restraining order that you believe the respondent may violate), you may want to consider relocating to an area with adequate law enforcement services.
- The jail will be releasing about 60 inmates to get to a level at which the decreased number of staff can safely manage the population. Further information on release procedures and times will be publicized closer to the time(s) of release, for safety reasons.
From a law enforcement perspective these cuts evoke troubling predictions of events to come. The first to be of great concern would be the cutting back of patrol hours from 20 per day to 8, 7 days to 5. One can see the systemic and trickledown effect as follows:
Many departments have callout times, which means periods of no scheduled patrol, resulting in calls to off duty officers to return to patrol to handle a priority call. Callouts usually result in overtime. Because of these service cuts swaths of 16 to 24 hours each day are not patrolled and the directive also declares during these times no deputy will be called out due to costs. Lack of patrol usually leads to increases in crime. Citizens having non-emergency calls during off times are directed to a private contract law enforcement records website. The records are collated and downloaded by the department to provide case report numbers and little else. It was indicated that no investigation would follow. Non-investigation curtails nearly completely the opportunity to arrest an offender and perhaps stopping other future crimes. When an arrest does occur there are certainly going to be booking restrictions so all but the most serious crimes will result in incarceration of the offender. Lack of response to crimes, can lead to belief among offenders of a small likelihood of arrest and will encourage crime. Lack of response also has the effect of creating a greater sense of apathy in the citizenry where they become unwilling to call the police even when they have been clearly victimized. And lastly it will certainly lead to tragedy and can foster the rise of citizens taking matters into their own hands or sew the seeds of vigilantism.
Even traditional efforts to mitigate lack of patrol resources have been curtailed. Reserve Deputies or Posse are typically used but the sheriff’s office states on their website it is no longer to have reserves patrol individually due to the high cost of gasoline and vehicle maintenance.
One year later, burglaries were up 50% in Grants Pass and 42% of the rest of the county. (These are cases that are actually reported) Grants Pass Public Safety Director Joe Henner commented the county is seeing a failing criminal justice system. “Our officers are saying they’re having more hostile and violent encounters with suspects, who are challenging them and fighting.” From an officer safety point of view this is dangerous; increasing violence, fewer deputies available for backup.
Total Felony and Misdemeanor prosecutions dropped from 2,400 to 1,400 due to the effect of staffing reductions in the District Attorney’s Office.
If the trend continues and crime rises it can lead to economic and civil decay that can feedback loop into less revenue and more problems for the criminal justice system. Blight causes property values and consequently tax collections to fall. Flight of residents to other areas due to crime adds to the problem along with diminishment of attracting outside investment and loss of reputation. Studies in criminology have shown that severe economic downturns usually result in increases in crime, further distressing an already crumbling criminal justice system.
As a direct result of these problems Ken Selig a former Law Enforcement Officer, forced into retirement due to budget cuts, and Pete Scaglione formed the North Valley Community Watch. The NVCW proffers to have 100 members meeting monthly to discuss crime and provide training. It also has a response team of twelve personnel who will respond to a reported non-life threatening call if summoned by one of the residents.
According to the NVCW website, they provide an umbrella service for local block watch organizations and assist citizens in reporting incidents to law enforcement. Additionally they state they can provide services to citizens through their responder service “designated to assist our members with potential problems law enforcement is unable to address”. The website parallels the Josephine County Sheriff’s Office (JCSO) website for using an online reporting system. JCSO hired citizenserviceportal.com for the aforementioned citizen crime reports, and NVCW created an analogue to this with their own. At the latter, a citizen can submit an e-mail requesting assistance. The website also has an architecture that is similar in many ways to a sheriff’s office website having: Links to jail inmate lists; the JCSO crime reporting site; stolen vehicle VIN checks; tax lot maps; property ownership searches; radio scanners; Oregon Revised Statutes; and Circuit Court Calendars. There is also a page where NVCW members can “NVCW members use this (upload) page to submit surveillance and evidence photos and documents to be catalogued in the NVCW database”, a form of records department. This might raise concerns about loosely organized band of citizens, taking “evidence” and other personal information can lead to risks of security and sensitive information and lack of oversight that is inherent in heavily regulated government law enforcement databases.
Several headlines in the media drew attention to the fact the NVCW provides an armed response. Oregon is a state that allows concealed weapons for licensed citizens. NVCW states its policy is to not respond to life-threatening calls and will respond to others if JCSO or OSP is unable to. It also provides services such as
The following is a list of situations the NVCW Responder Team will address for NVCW program members when law enforcement has been previously notified and indicated they will not respond:
- Checking and clearing business and residential buildings when the owner feels a trespasser or burglar may still be present.
- Responding to suspicious persons lurking in the neighbourhood so that a deterrent presence is provided.
- Responding to concerns that a person is trespassing on private property not open to the public.
- Where NVCW members have been victimized by a burglar or thief and needs assistance in reporting the crime to law enforcement.
The NVCW, according to their website, does not respond to felony calls, domestic disturbances, or civil disputes.
The situation has the potential to result in a breakdown in the traditional order of what society expects from modern law enforcement and to a certainly measurable degree has. The NVCW and other citizens groups like it are evidence of this. Having citizen agents responding to what might be a minor call such as a cold storage shed burglary has the potential to escalate instantly to a dangerous situation where the burglar was hiding and chooses and armed reaction. Furthermore the level of training of these responders, if they are ordinary citizens, is going to be substandard to those required of professional and reserve law enforcement officers. Lack of training and experience, coupled with loose background and suitability requirements will lead to problems great and small.
While the current leadership of NVCW might be good as is the case with having a retired law enforcement officer in its leadership. Lack of public oversight and events can lead to a breakdown of whatever professionalism level they might have and it could reduce towards essentially extra-legal practices.
In the “Old West” resources and the relatively rudimentary and fledgling police practices of the time relied heavily upon citizens taking matters into their own hands or forming watch groups which sometimes were as problematic as the crime they were self appointed to address.
Many remote and sparsely populated areas had a few professional law enforcement officials who relied heavily on assistance from these groups or individuals. It is a system that certainly has flaws but was the reality during the time. Are we seeing this structure about to be repeated?
The future does not look hopeful if some fundamental revenue sources are not acquired, either locally or provided by the state in the form of direct revenue or like kind contributions such as the establishment of a state police augmentation. Long term problems are inevitable. Hopefully a resolution could be found before things worsen.
Sources
Oregon Live
nydailynews.com
Josephine County Sheriff’s Office
Fox News
North Valley Citizens Watch
Josephine County Budget (PDF)
A community ripe for privatization of its police force.
$300 for police protection of a $200,000 home seems like a deal to me. The community is finding out now what the lack of a tax levy means. Now the PTB in this community need to do a better job of educating people on what the tax levy proposal is all about, how it’s really a good deal, and put it up for another vote.
If the federal government owns most of the county, does it have no financial responsibility to the community? A year ago I drove through southwest Oregon and was taken aback by the starkness of the region.
GIL Gilbertson is a recognized “constitutional” sheriff. I wonder???
List of situations? Number 1, 2, 3, 4 are easy to remedy, keep your fire arm close as our forefathers predicted to protect yourself and your property. The people are unable to count on Public Officials to do their job.
I am not sure if what we have seen with the police brutality, over reaction/ overbearing attitude and belief that their authority trumps all is a function of too much police involvement as opposed to people who have no been properly veted before being accepted into the academies/hired.
It’s going to be interesting to see what the crime rate does in Josephine County with an armed citizenry
leej, We see here, on a regular basis, posts that show the horrors of too much police involvement. Having worked on a daily basis w/ the victims of crimes, and having been the victim of 2 shooting incidents, there are few people walking this earth who are more knowledgeable or empathetic to the victims of crime. However, it is citizens who help prevent crime exponentially more than police. The police solve crimes. Their presence certainly helps prevent crime, but if you had a police force large enough to PREVENT crime in Chicago you would literally need an army, and they would need to be armed like an army, not a police force. Too many or too little cops, it’s a no brainer for me anyway. I’ll take too little every time. But, to each their own.
Im not sure that too little government rather then too much includes too little police rather then too much (at least once one becomes a victim, or has a relative or someone they know become a victim of crime or attempted crime). Hopefully they will resubmit this to another vote now that they have visual proof of what the lack of funding can cause. (And also for those plaes where the kids have seen their education go downhill y voters not adequately funding the schools.
There is, has, and always will be an inequitable distribution of law enforcement services throughout this country. Many small towns and large cities have fat assed cops sitting in offices eating donuts. Some large cities are understaffed but the taxing Dems who run big cities usually take care of the police unions. It is the rural areas that are most often understaffed. They don’t have the money to pay high taxes and therefore have bare boned police, fire, and all government. The ironic aspect is for the most part they don’t whine and cry about it. They, like the vast majority of Americans, would much rather have too little government than too much. In a perfect world, we would have just the right amount of taxes and government. That ended in the 1930’s.
People who live in cities with well funded law enforcement agencies are not aware of what it is like in rural America. I recall in the story about the Arkansas sheriff and game warden who died trying to save two women from flood waters. One commenter said they should have waited for “proper” rescue personnel. There was no “proper” rescue squad, the sheriff and game warden were it.
We have had a rash of home invasions in our area recently. Last I heard late yesterday, they were still looking for two guys who invaded a home, taped the woman resident to a chair and threatened to kill her husband when he came home if she did not give them the combination to the safe in the bedroom. Two elderly homeowners gave their home invaders Darwin Awards, but that is the exception, not the rule. And this is in an area where there are will-staffed Sheriff’s departments.
Have those who advocate for doing away or minimizing rural law enforcement really thought this through to its ultimate consequences? From the comments, it does not appear to be so. I have a question for those folks. Would you be willing to go on a call alone to where shots are being fired, knowing there is no backup?
The incident reported at the link occurred in the city, but it is personal to me because one of my sons took cover in a ditch, where he was pinned down by the sniper fire. There were plenty of officers at the scene, but what if it had just been him in a rural area with no hope of backup? Is this what we want?
http://articles.latimes.com/1996-04-13/news/mn-58120_1_fire-kills-dies
The past is gone. The future does not exist. There is only the now.
There is only one time I can think of where living in the past is a good thing.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EsCyC1dZiN8
Sure, living in the past is romantic – often romantic fiction too, but now is the only thing that’s real.
Let’s drown government in a bathtub and let anarchy (with privatization and profit) begin! Who is with me? David?
I so loath when that happens.
Skip wrote: “How do we know 19th century law enforcement isn’t compatible with twentieth century society? Was this intentionally written by the author as a logical fallacy…”
Good point, Skip. The so-called “Wild West” was not as wild has Hollywood has led us to believe.
http://libertarianstandard.com/2010/04/07/how-wild-was-the-wild-west-in-fact/
I would love to see this kind of downsizing here in my community. Seems like the primary job of Sheriff deputies on patrol is to catch speeders.
Drove my Chevy to the levy, but the levy was dry….
Without a tax base for essential services and the lathing and fear of taxes, we will be seeing such scenarios more often, no doubt.
The author wrote: “Could situations like this resurrect some of the nineteenth century practices necessary in the West that are no longer compatible with twenty first century American Society?
I thought the question, itself, made a possibly erroneous statement within it; “that are no longer compatible with twenty first century American society.”
How do we know 19th century law enforcement isn’t compatible with twentieth century society?
Was this intentionally written by the author as a logical fallacy to manipulate those non-critical thinkers into accepting the assumption. The author surely did not support his contention with examples or other forms of evidence.
This is typical of the memes from both sides of the two headed dragon, the Dems and Reps and the lame stream media they control.
There is not much evidence available that would provide someone the data in order to make an informed decision that private police are any worse or better than public police, especially if gun control and self defense laws were repealed.
See I can play the game to, except there is evidence that control laws restrict peoples ability to protect themselves from criminals.
Are their more death caused by guns in society without or with fewer gun control laws? Interesting, the answer is not the amount of guns in society, but other factors which vary between societies.
In response to Dredd’s argument: Our law is supposed to protect us. “the Posse Comitatus Act. was to limit the powers of Federal government in using Federal military personnel to enforce the state laws. Posse Comitatus Act is the United States federal law (18 U.S.C. § 1385, original at 20 Stat. 152) that was passed on June 18, 1878.
This begs two questions; 1. Is 19th century law of the militarization of police powers, as has occurred especially over the last two Presidential Administrations, a necessity in 21st century American society?
Would the use of 18the century constitutional law, a well regulated militia, better protect and secure our rights, then the constant use of standing armies, which, by the way, is unconstitutional according to Article 1, section 8 clause? 12; **To raise money to support Armies, but no Appropriation of Money, to that use shall be for a longer period then two years.** Other clause(s) have also been deemed to require Congress to Declare War in order for our government to engage our troops in combat.
Clause 15 of the same section, notates: **To provide for the calling forth of the Militia, to execute the laws of the Union, suppress Insurrections and repel Invasions.**
If the history of government has not shown us many truths, it has shown us one thing “It is impossible and imprudent to trust men or women of powerful political means, to uphold any rule of law.”
Our foundation of the Rule of Law, The Constitution of the United States of America, clearly provides, the clearly untrustworthy men and women of powerful political means, the ability to lawfully alter and amend the Constitution. Despite this ability and noted methods, the untrustworthy (despots) for the lack of a better word, have chosen to negate the Constitutional and our rule of law, for reasons “contrary” to the majorities best interest, and instead have constantly abrogated the Constitution and usurped many of the rights protected by the amendments, by treasonous means, thus colluding in an insurrection against both “We the People” and our rule of law. Sadly our history is full of these abrogations and our society, in this authors opinion, is suffering greatly for it.
Agree this is a recipe for disaster. Hopefully the Feds will spring for some grant money to make up for the shortfall caused by pulling the financial rug out from under the county.
If I were a resident of the county, I would be very worried. Given that there is already a spike in crime, it is only bound to get worse. It is good the volunteer groups are currently being supervised and trained by former LEOs, but how long can that go on?
This is our future across the board if the small government crowd continues to cut infrastructure funds.
Penny wise, pound foolish.
Very interesting, but sad story Darren. This is austerity on steroids. When the public becomes frightened, all hell is bound to break loose. Someone is going to get hurt either because of limited police presence or the neighborhood watch personnel are going to find themselves in a situation that they are not trained for.
“Could situations like this resurrect some of the nineteenth century practices necessary in the West that are no longer compatible with twenty first century American Society?
…
The situation has the potential to result in a breakdown in the traditional order of what society expects from modern law enforcement and to a certainly measurable degree has.” – DS
This public mindset may facilitate something perhaps worse, the military becoming the police, since the military NSA is already the number one spy (provider of data about the public).
The military is considered, by the pubic (according to historical Gallup Polls) to be the most competent entity in American society (Stockholm Syndrome on Steroids? – 2). Instability is a known characteristic of a plutonomy.