Mobilization means towns are scrambling to fill shifts
By CHIP GUY
Sussex Bureau reporter
01/30/2003
Many Delaware police officers and prison guards are trading in their badges for boots as military reservists and National Guard troops are called to active duty for a possible war in Iraq.
Some police agencies are scrambling to fill shifts, plan overtime budgets and determine how best to protect the public because some of their employees could be gone for weeks, months or even a year.
About 400 National Guard members and at least 300 reservists in Delaware are now on active duty, meaning they have had to leave behind families and jobs. Seventy of them, or 10 percent, are police and correctional officers.
As the Pentagon orders the largest mobilization since the Persian Gulf War of 1991, that number is likely to grow. Almost 95,000 people are mobilized across the country.
Pentagon officials have said that if President Bush orders America to war with Iraq, the eventual number could rival the 265,000 mobilized in the Gulf War.
Such call-ups can put larger organizations, such as Delaware State Police, in a bind as troopers have to be moved around to fill the vacancies, said Lt. Tim Winstead, spokesman for state police.
For small-town forces, the activation of troops can have an even greater impact.
In the Kent County town of Felton, the police force has only four officers, including the chief, to cover a community of about 800 residents.
Things move pretty smoothly in the department when it's fully staffed, Chief Levi Brown said. But take one officer out of the mix, "and it just sends you into a tailspin," Brown said.
One of Brown's officers is an Air Force reservist, and the chief has been retired from the military for only two years.
If America has to fight a prolonged war, he could be called back to serve, making matters in Felton even worse.
For now, Brown is almost sure he will lose the reservist, Sgt. Chris Swan.
"We will feel it, there's no doubt," Brown said. "When you have a four-man department ... it's just a large portion of that pie that's cut out and no longer there.
"And you have to try to fill it the best way that you can," he said.
The last time Brown lost Swan for military duty was from September 2001 until late October 2002, although Swan was able to continue working part time.
The department exhausted its roughly $25,000 overtime budget in less than seven months.
Brown had to pick up extra shifts without pay.
And the number of hours police were on the streets in Felton each day had to be trimmed from 22 to 16 hours.
While there are no figures collected on the number of military reservists or National Guard members who are police officers, firefighters or emergency medical technicians, military officials and those who work with the Guard and Reserve said those fields traditionally have supplied a significant portion of troops.
"Many of them come from the same kind of civilian jobs," said Gene Hebert, a Frederica resident who serves as chairman of the Delaware Committee for Employer Support of the Guard and Reserve, a group that informs employers and employees who serve in the military on federal employment laws.
Small-town police forces aren't the only work organizations to be sapped by military activations.
At the state Department of Correction, 170 of 2,500 employees, or 6.8 percent, are in the Guard or Reserve, said Beth Welch, a department spokeswoman.
Nearly 60 already have been called to duty.
Nearly 90 percent of the 170 are correctional officers working in prisons.
With 105 vacancies already in the department in a time of tight finances, moving staff around to provide appropriate security can be "extremely challenging," Welch said.
Welch said the department would fill the void by spending more in overtime and moving higher-ranking officers into shifts when needed.
The potential impact a larger call-up would have on state, New Castle County and Wilmington police is not as severe, officials for those agencies said.
Of more than 620 officers in state police, only 34, or 5.5 percent, are with the Guard or Reserve, Winstead, the state police spokesman, said.
Ten New Castle County police officers are eligible to be called up out of a force of 333.
Wilmington police did not have a final count, but said any call-up would be manageable.
A call-up wouldn't be a major problem for any of the 63 volunteer fire departments and ambulance squads across the state, either, said Jim Cubbage, executive secretary for the Delaware Volunteer Firemen's Association.
Swan, the officer from Felton who is an Air Force reservist, said he thinks Felton would fare just fine in his absence, even though it would mean more work for his colleagues and perhaps cause some town residents to worry a bit about security.
"Everybody likes to have a police officer around," Swan said.
Fred Casper, owner of G & B Market on Main Street, said he was confident things would work out.
The Felton police force handled about 1,400 calls last year, fewer than four calls a day.
In his 36 years of business, Casper said he has called the police about three times.
"We're a small, quiet town," he said.
Reach Chip Guy at 856-7373 or cguy@delawareonline.com.
