Maine | Assessment Services Review

Public Safety Voices | Sheriff Joel Merry

The opioid epidemic and succession planning are my two top concerns right now.

In Sagadahoc County, the opioid epidemic is of real concern. There are a lot of issues related to it that require a great deal of our time, from the number of calls we take regarding overdoses, to investigators working on trafficking cases, dealing with the number of people in our jails who are addicted and getting folks into treatment and recovery – it’s a lot for any department.

Sagadahoc County Sheriff Joel A. Merry | Image: Bangor Daily News

Succession planning is my top human resources issue. Retirement is the main reason we’re losing people, though we recently lost two transport deputies to the private sector. On the patrol side, we’ve had a very stable workforce, but we do have some pending retirements. This concerns me due to what my fellow law enforcement administrators are going through with recruiting. It’s a real concern. When I started my career in law enforcement 35 years ago, it was so competitive that I didn’t get my first two attempts.

We’re answering the call with life-saving aid, aggressive tactics, education and recovery.

Sagadahoc County is one of the first agencies to start carrying Narcan in Maine. We did this because we service a lot of small rural communities where EMS are 15-30 minutes away. Having a deputy with AEDs and Narcan can save a life.

The other thing we’ve done is get more aggressive on the law enforcement side trying to eradicate the traffickers and educate the public. We’ve trained patrol in interdiction strategies and we work closely with MDEA (Maine Drug Enforcement Administration) on public awareness, as well as some diversion tactics.

The tactic I’m most proud of is one where we connect people with a recovery coach and group counseling. Our programs deputy carries a caseload of 7-15 folks who are required to check in every night and meet with him face-to-face once a week. They are also subject to random drug testing and need to be employed or looking. We want to hold them accountable. It’s another level of probation and provides additional support to the probation office to help keep them on the right track.

Thinking ahead, we’re providing leadership training, adding specializations, and performing youth outreach.

Everyone who applies for a promotional position gets to attend a leadership training program through Granite State Police Career Counseling. It consists of a one-day leadership course and a three-day course on supervision, teaching them what supervision is within an agency, what does it mean and how will your role change as a supervisor.

Sagadahoc County Sheriff’s Dept. attending a You Matter event at Woolwich Central School. The officers greet students as they arrive.

We’re also adding in some specializations to build skills and to help keep our deputies interested in this agency. To that end, we recently restarted a K-9 program, and we have another deputy who is specializing in accident reconstruction.

We have done some youth outreach, including Project ALERT, which is similar to DARE. Prevention work is something I would like to do more of. I’ve toyed with the idea of a visitation program such as deputies stopping by schools to say hello and have lunch with the kids.

9/11 was a defining moment in my career.

One of the defining moments of my career came when I was a lieutenant with the Bath Police Department. My chief at the time was away attending the FBI academy, which corresponded with 9/11. A lot of things were fast moving. There were so many unknowns: are we a target, are we next?

The USS Zumwalt at Bath Iron Works. Image: Bangor Daily News

In Bath we have Bath Iron Works, which is a major U.S. shipyard and producer of naval ships. We had a lot of protocols around that – we had to provide guards 24/7 to protect the military assets. We were working very closely with neighboring law enforcement departments and built strong partnerships during that time.

Working with other agencies in both the private and public sector, I had to learn a lot of communication skills very quickly and make sure information was being shared — that I was communicating with all stakeholders. I had to focus. It provided me with insight into what leadership needs to be: As a leader, you have to be thinking about the now and what happens tomorrow at the same time.

We care.

What is the one thing I’d want our community to know about law enforcement? We care. We really do care about the health and well-being of our community.

Our communities are a great place to live, work and play, and as members of law enforcement, we work hard to keep them as safe as possible so people can live without fear and enjoy their lives.

-Sheriff Joel Merry, Sagadahoc County Sheriff’s Office, Maine

Public Safety Voices | Sheriff Kevin Joyce

We’ve been forced to make a lot of changes in our hiring practices.

“Filling vacancies – specifically in corrections, and to a lesser extent in patrol – in today’s workforce has forced us to make a lot of changes in our hiring practices. To start with, we have to move a lot quicker, which causes anxiety in HR at times: the whole ‘haste makes waste’ adage. But for some Millennials, there’s an expectation for immediate gratification: instant replies, constant communication. It’s labor intensive for my command staff.

“We’re also finding that fewer and fewer applicants make it through the entire application process. Before, we used to get a mass number of applicants for an opening, and it would take about eight applicants to get one good candidate. Now, only 2-3 at a time are dribbling in.

“We spend a lot of money just trying to recruit people. We’re competing against employers who don’t have the rigorous vetting process we do, and against the current reputation of law enforcement in general, as well as the nontraditional work hours and demands of the job.

“Attending local job fairs and placing job announcements in the paper used to be all it took in terms of advertising, but now we have to hit every job fair – even those a couple hundred miles away. We even installed an electric message board at the end of our driveway to advertise vacancies.

“There are people who still respect what we do, and there a lot of people doing good work still. But the role of our command staff has changed to some degree; they’ve had to become cheerleaders for their staff.”

Thirty-two years on the job, and I wouldn’t change a thing.

“The reality of the job is that there are a lot of calls and ways you assist people that have an impact on their lives. The job is whatever you make of it.

“I have 32 years on the job. It’s gone by fast, and I wouldn’t change a thing. You see danger, trauma – what people would consider a lot of negatives. But you see a lot of positives, too.

“I’ve had several people whom I’ve arrested for various issues, or given tickets to, who have later shaken my hand and thanked me because at the time it happened, they were misguided, and if I hadn’t done that, God knows where they would be. That’s the real reward of the job.”

The job isn’t about one officer or one agency – together, we make an impact.

“As an officer, you are a member of a profession that together works as an aggregate. We all make an impact, it’s not just one officer or one agency: It’s everybody working together.

“We have to hold ourselves accountable while trying to hold the people we serve accountable. We have to work to keep the profession honorable.”

–Sheriff Kevin Joyce, Cumberland County, Maine, Sheriff’s Department