Bend police OT adds up in court

Bend police officials are looking for ways to reduce overtime costs, but they cannot do so without the cooperation of many parties, from the Deschutes County District Attorney’s Office to their own police officers.

“Right now, the (district attorney’s) office and the municipal court are a big driver of our overtime, calling people in on their days off,” Bend Police Chief Jeff Sale said Jan. 25, when city councilors and the budget committee got an advance look at city financial issues for the next two years.

The department can only address certain issues, such as officer scheduling, through a new contract with the police union. The city and Bend Police Association are negotiating a contract now. Other challenges require coordination with the Bend Municipal Court and DA’s office. Chief Deputy District Attorney Mary Anderson said prosecutors and police are already coordinating.

Police overtime has fluctuated over the years. The highest amount in the last decade was 11,116 hours in 2005, according to data provided by the city. The lowest was 8,983 hours in 2006. Overtime cost the city roughly $580,000 in 2012. When actual overtime costs are adjusted for inflation, the hourly overtime cost rose from roughly $51 an hour in 2003 to $54 an hour in 2012.

The current annual budget for the Police Department is roughly $18.6 million, of which personnel costs are $14 million, according to a January city presentation.

Sale in January said he wants to schedule police employees more efficiently, and explore whether the department could use technology to allow off-duty officers to testify from home in some cases. Last week, Sale said he could not discuss overtime and shift schedules while the city bargains for a new contract with the Bend Police Association.

“All of this ties back to scheduling,” Sale said. The city and police union signed ground rules that prohibit either side from discussing with the media the topics covered in bargaining. However, bargaining sessions are open to the public.

Under the current police contract, the city pays an officer at least three hours of overtime to work on his or her day off. If an off-duty officer must testify in court, the city pays a minimum of four hours of overtime. Officers are not supposed to receive this overtime if they are called back to court within one hour of the end of a regularly scheduled shift, or two hours before the start of a normal shift.

Sale in January said the Police Department and DA’s office worked to reduce overtime a couple of years ago, but the hours crept up again. The Police Department is also working with the municipal court to identify blocks of time when officers are working, to avoid the court asking officers to testify during their days off, Sale said.

Anderson said it can be challenging, and often impossible, to avoid calling off-duty officers in to testify. Bend police officers are scheduled so that more are on duty during peak hours of crime, during night and graveyard shifts, Anderson said. As a result, these officers nearly always receive overtime when they testify before a grand jury or in court during the day.

“It does make it difficult when you have half the officers working nights or graveyard,” Anderson said.

To manage complex scheduling, the district attorney’s office has two employees, one full-time and one part-time, who manage the logistics of grand juries. These employees work with the Bend Police Department to schedule officer testimony efficiently and avoid cutting into their sleeping hours and scheduled vacation, Anderson said.

The DA’s office also tries to schedule officer court appearances close together when possible to avoid unnecessary overtime. However, Anderson said the office can only do this when officers share their court appearance schedules and “there are times when officers don’t want to limit their overtime.” A majority of officers do work with prosecutors on this, Anderson said.

In the grand jury system, one officer can testify on behalf of other officers, Sale said in January. Anderson said the DA’s office uses this method on occasion, but it is not always possible.

“Under Oregon law, the district attorney’s office is required to offer evidence at grand jury that is the same as would be presented at trial,” Anderson said. “If there is a situation where an officer can testify to what another officer did, we do that, but we don’t cut corners there.”

Prosecutors may only present evidence to a grand jury that would be admissible at trial, Anderson said. The grand jury process must move quickly when a suspect is in custody. After the suspect is arraigned, prosecutors have five calendar days to present the case to a grand jury, Anderson said.

At trial, officers must be in the courtroom because the defendant has a right to challenge his or her accuser, Anderson said.

Sale also said in January that the Police Department is working on setting up technology that will allow officers to testify from home using a laptop computer, when it is necessary during their days off.

Other law enforcement agencies already use technology to have officers testify before grand juries. Capt. Brian McNaughton of the Redmond Police Department said officers have testified via video conference equipment for roughly eight years. Officers who testify on their days off still receive a minimum of four hours of overtime pay under their contract with the city, but the program saves money, McNaughton said. He believes the program lowers fuel costs and reduces wear and tear on police vehicles, although the city has not done a study to quantify the savings.

Officers scheduled to testify while on duty avoid the commute time to Bend, so they can spend more time on other work. “It’s kind of nice to be able to sit here and do it over the network,” McNaughton said. “The grand jury can see the officer, the officer can see the grand jury, and testify that way.”

McNaughton said he is unaware of any drawbacks to grand jury testimony via video conference technology. “We even have some of the Bend guys that live in Redmond; we’ve allowed them to come in and use it,” McNaughton said.

Anderson said the DA uses this “simultaneous transmission” technology, which provides real-time transmission of audio and video, for law enforcement testimony from many outlying areas, including Sisters, La Pine and Terrebonne.

Anderson said that because police officers are often called in on their off-duty days, they do not get much recovery time.

“I think it’s important to note officers have to work a set schedule, and then they still have to come in and work more,” Anderson said.