Boone County Sheriff’s Department still understaffed

Two months after the Boone County Sheriff’s Department said it was understaffed, department officials said Monday they’re still looking to fill some positions.

“Well, we’ve made progress, that’s the good news,” said Major Tom Reddin with the Boone County Sheriff’s Department. “We’ve had staffing issues both in the corrections division and on the road.”

At the beginning of 2014, the department was short eight deputies in street patrols. Now, three openings remain.

In June, department officials told ABC 17 News a lack of qualified applicants was hindering the hiring process.

But Reddin said they’ve made some changes since the beginning of summer.

“We’ve looked at and revamped our entire hiring process, set up a selection process, tried to speed things, tried to encourage more applicants, recruitment, that kind of thing,” he said.

Reddin said that has helped some, but deputies are still having to work extra to make up for the shortfall.

“Unfortunately that’s what happens when we’re short,” he said. “We end up with a little more overtime. We try to make sure our folks are generally not working more than 12 or a little bit over that hours. Our road folks are scheduled to work 10 hour shifts, but we really try not to keep it too much longer beyond that. Sometimes it goes into 12, 14 hours, but we want to make sure our folks get at least eight hours down time.”

In the jail, four positions have been filled since June, leaving eight openings.

But Jail Administrator Warren Brewer said it has still been rough.

“We just take each day as it comes, but August was a very slow month for us,” Brewer said.

And he said the challenges won’t be fixed overnight. Brewer said right now, they don’t even have anyone they’re looking at for the positions because of a lack of applicants.

Reddin said there are a few people in training and when those recruits finish training, he said that will help out a lot on street patrols.