Commissioners OK part-time deputies Washington County officials vote to continue Sheriff’s Department arrangement

MACHIAS – Full-time county employees who also work as part-time sheriff’s deputies may continue to work both jobs, Washington County commissioners decided Wednesday.

The unanimous vote to continue the longtime county practice came one hour into the commissioners’ meeting after several people – including a woman working as a drug prevention specialist – told the commissioners that the 11 deputies in question were among the most experienced law enforcement officials in the county.

The commissioners had been questioning the arrangement for months, citing overdrafts in the sheriff’s overtime budget for full-time employees.

All but two of the part-time deputies who have full-time county jobs work for divisions of the Sheriff’s Department, either as corrections officers in the Washington County Jail or as dispatchers in the county’s Regional Communication Center.

Sheriff Joseph Tibbetts told the commissioners Thursday that the 11 part-timers handled 28 percent of all complaints his department responded to in 2001. The department’s four full-time patrol officers – two of whom are assigned to opiate drug investigations – covered 44 percent of the complaints. The county’s 30 additional part-time deputies covered the remaining 28 percent.

Tibbetts said the amount of overtime the 11 employees received from taxpayer funds was $8,200, with additional overtime money coming from grants for programs such as seat belt and OUI checks.

With the exception of the sheriff’s administrative assistant, the 11 part-timers are paid for the time they work in excess of 40 hours a week by a formula that was determined under the Fair Labor Standards Act, Tibbetts said.

The formula is based on the difference between an employee’s full-time hourly wage and the $7.50 an hour the county pays part-time deputies. The difference is then multiplied by 11/2.

Full-time corrections officers and dispatchers make $10 to $14 an hour, depending on how long they have worked for the county. The sheriff’s administrative assistant is salaried and paid for her work as a deputy at a straight $7.50 an hour.

Dennis Perry, a full-time dispatcher and a part-time deputy, told the commissioners that he isn’t getting rich from the arrangement and holds down another part-time job in Eastport. But, Perry said, he loves his work for the Sheriff’s Department the way he loves his family.

“Down my way, it’s just Lester and I and Frank Gardner,” Perry said, referring to deputies who cover far eastern Washington County. “As a part-time deputy, I had to come up with my own radio, gun and uniform. I’m just asking you not to take this away from me.”

Referring to statements by Tibbetts that the 11 deputies in questions always responded when asked while other part-timers were reluctant to come out, Commissioner William Boone wondered aloud if their response rate would be better if they were paid $12 or $13 an hour rather than $7.50.

But Commissioner Winola Burke said if the 11 are the ones who do the work, they’re the ones who should be paid the additional money.

“Somebody has to do the job, and we have to pay for it one way or another,” Burke said. “The older people are afraid and they want to know that someone will come when they hear a noise at night.”

Washington County’s epidemic of prescription drug abuse was mentioned several times during the discussion. Elderly people with pain prescriptions are frequently targets of addicts, and there have been several incidents of people breaking into their homes, particularly in the Calais area, Burke said.

Commissioner John Crowley, who preceded Tibbetts as sheriff, said the commissioners, the sheriff and the bookkeeper had to sit down together and work out a realistic budget that forecast overtime expenses, and showed revenues, such as grant funds, that could be applied to those expenses.

“We’ve got to put a cap on this,” Crowley said.