Town Council Budget Workshop # 5 - April 30 , 2026

001All right. Welcome everyone. You ready to get started? All right. Call this meeting to order. Our What is this? Fifth? Sixth? Losing count now. Number budget workshop for Thursday, April 30th. And if everyone could rise and do the Pledge of Allegiance. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. >> [clears throat] >> All right. Thank you, everyone. Yeah, so next on the agenda is public comment. This portion of the meeting is specifically set aside for comments from the public who are asked to limit their comments to 2 minutes. Any person interested in providing public comment by email should email [email protected] prior to 4:00 p.m. on the day of the meeting to have

002their public comment read into the record. Do we have anybody that would like to speak this evening? Hello, Brendan Kears, 699 Old Main Street, Rocky Hill. Um Well, rather than having multiple speakers come up here and address one subject in the interest of time, I'd like about 5 minutes to of your time to present our perspective from the Fraternal Order of Police Lodge 43, Rocky Hill Police Union. So, with your permission. Absolutely, yeah. It'd be great. So, good evening, members of the Rocky Hill Town Council. My name is Brendan Kears. I'm a sergeant with the Rocky Hill Police Department. I'm here tonight speaking in my capacity as the vice president of the Fraternal Order of Police Lodge 43. On behalf of our membership and the views I express this evening are those of the union

003and not an official position of the department or town administration. It's nerve-wracking talking in front of you guys like this. >> [laughter] >> I want to begin by recognizing the effort that goes into developing a municipal budget. These are never simple decisions and they reflect the competing needs of the entire community. From the perspective of the police department, the budget represents an important step in sustaining the level of service the residents of Rocky Hill expect and deserve. Policing today is more complex and more resource intensive than ever before. Calls for service are increasingly detailed, time consuming, and require sustained officer involvement. At the same time, Rocky Hill continues to operate with fewer personnel and fewer resources than many of our surrounding communities while maintaining a high standard of service. That standard is made possible only

004through efficiency and commitment from the officers on the street, but there are limits to how far that can be stretched. We are seeing a steady increase in mental health-related incidents, complex domestic violence cases, and situations that require prolonged engagement and specialized responses. These are not quick calls as they require time, patience, de-escalation, coordination with outside resources, and often extended on-scene presence. At the same time, mandates from the state of Connecticut and evolving case law continue to expand the responsibilities placed on police officers. While additional positions have been added to the department over time, those positions have largely been used to meet increased staffing minimums and to backfill school resource officer assignments, and other specialized and support roles rather than expanding our core patrol strength. We fully recognize and value the importance of these assignments and

005the role they play in the community. However, they do not increase the number of officers available to handle patrol operations, the core function of our department responsible for the vast majority of our emergency calls for service. What this means operationally is simple. Each call takes longer and each officer is tied up for more time. It is not uncommon to have every officer on the shift tied up with a call for service. How does this respect responding to an unconscious child on the opposite end of town or a burglar alarm for a local business? Investing in additional officers is not only an operational decision, but it's an investment in the people behind the badge. Every additional officer added to the schedule reduces force holdovers and ordered overtime, allowing officers to return home to their families when

006their shifts are supposed to end. It means fewer missed dinners, fewer missed bedtime routines, fewer missed family events, and less cumulative stress on the men and women who serve this town. Better staffing improves morale, supports mental and physical well-being, and creates a healthier work-life balance for those entrusted with protecting this community. When we invest in staffing, we're not only improving service, but we are improving the quality of life for the officers who provide it. You'll hear from Chief Klett later about the need to increase manpower. We ask that you heed that call today and future budgets. Equally important is an investment in the department's fleet. We can't keep talking about police vehicles like they're just everyday cars. They're not. They are mobile offices, emergency response platforms, protective cover in dangerous situations, and the equipment our

007officers rely on to do their jobs safely. They help to ensure we come home to our families at the end of our shifts. Reliable patrol vehicles are a necessity and need to be a yearly budgeted item. They must be ready at all times to respond to critical incidents, transport equipment, support officers in dynamic situations. Maintaining a fleet that is dependable and a prop- and properly equipped is essential to maintaining public safety. It's also a direct representation of the town as we're the most visible agency with 24/7 viewership by our residents and visitors. To that end, we will inevitably hear tonight about the take-home vehicle program benefit. This has become a recurring annual debate, so I want to be clear. This is a benefit that the union will defend. The union believes that this program is

008a mutually enjoyed benefit as the town gets longer usage out of the fleet with less maintenance associated with newer vehicles. It is also a critical recruiting and retention tool at a time when it is increasingly difficult to attract and keep quality police officers. In the current hiring environment, it gives Rocky Hill a meaningful advantage in drawing qualified candidates and retaining experienced personnel who might otherwise look to other better resourced agencies. This program is an asset that directly benefits the town while carrying a relatively minor impact on the overall municipal budget. It allows officers to respond to critical incidents in short order from their assigned vehicles with the equipment they need immediately available. Without that program, officers would first need to respond to headquarters, get dressed, secure a cruiser if one is available, secure weapons, protective

009equipment, and then respond to the scene, costing valuable time when minutes matter. In emergency situations, that delay can have real consequences in a small town operating with only four cops on the road, three cops on midnights. Maintaining the take-home vehicle program benefit is about readiness, efficiency, ensuring the fastest possible response when the community needs us most. When we When we compare Rocky Hill to surrounding communities such as Newington and Wethersfield, we see that they are significantly more resourced by millions of dollars. This directly correlates to their ability to focus on increased efforts for the residents. Rocky Hill has been has seen massive residential growth growth over the past few years. Effectively, that means more vehicles and more foot traffic, more businesses coming to town, more calls for service, and yet we have not seen a

010palpable growth in resources centered around public safety. We cannot continue expecting greater service from the same resources year after year. If the town continues to grow, the police department must grow with it. All in all, the police budget as proposed will move Rocky Hill in the right direction by increasing operations and supporting the department's ability to meet and exceed its responsibilities. We believe increasing patrol, strengthening supervisory coverage, investing in technology, and maintaining a reliable fleet of emergency vehicles while preserving long-standing benefits will better prepare us for today's demands and those ahead. Trying to meet today's expectations with yesterday's output will inevitably become a blueprint for failure. It also represents a commitment to the department staff that work every day of the year, every second of the day, to ensure that this great town is protected.

011It is easy to review a spreadsheet and see figures and line items, but it requires greater level of consideration to understand how those dollars actually affect public safety, the people doing the work, and the lives of the people we serve. So, thank you for your time. Thank you. Do we have any other members from the public? Any other public comments? Do we have anything? >> No. Anything written? >> don't want to discourage any of the other officers if they'd like to make a comment as well, if they don't feel like that was everything that needed to be said. Good? Good. All right. Thank you for that. And I'll just say I do appreciate hearing also the voice of of the union, and I look forward to same same thing with Board of Ed and other

012departments that may be represented like that as well. Um Chief Yeah, just give me a second. >> [clears throat] >> First, while I'm getting set up, I just wanted to say thank you for for the words. And actually made my job a little bit easier tonight telling you a lot of things that that I'm here conveying to you through budgetary needs. Um you know, the folks you see behind you, I'm not going to point people out individually, but there is somebody standing back there that I know was in was basically in competition with another police department and chose us. And I think everyone up there, I won't ask them to raise their hands, but I can assure you that 99% of them were looking at other places and came here. And that's what we should

013be most grateful for and keep in mind when we're considering this budget tonight is that the benefits we provide, the funding resources that allows us to keep doing our job and providing the services every day, day in and day out, is essential to allowing us to do our job successfully, keeping those services going, but also recruiting, retaining folks like you see standing back here. And you know, we can evaluate and judge our work on arrests and tickets and car stops, right? That's not it's Yeah, that's a metric. How I judge it is when I walk through town hall and see how people interact with our officers, how when we walk into our school systems and these kids are smiling at us and approaching us like we're superheroes. I can take you down, and I encourage

014anyone come with me to the school on Brook Street when we do the pie giveaway, and they look at us like they don't know who we are and they're scared of us. And that's because we're not in their schools every single day. And that's something that you cannot put a value on. Um kind of going off my script here, but thank you for the talking points. I'll get on to my script, but as I get going thank you to them. It's very important I point out that none of this happens. Like, you know, I'm not saying my job is easy, it's not, but their job's harder than mine. They're out there last Tuesday alone. How many were dealing last Tuesday at the hospital and tied up on that for the entire day? Last Tuesday we

015had an EDP in the morning. We had to have a call on EDP, but essentially everyone in this room was here for a better part of 16 hours tied up on three three calls essentially between the visit hospital visits, one of our officers got injured. Um but tied up on arrests, detaining people, and and keeping our community safe for things that you don't even think about when you're home sleeping and folks at home hope never happens to them. So, for that I thank every one of you for coming. I hope you stick around for the comments to get to thank you again, but I'll move on to my my com my comments. And Ray grabs his mic, I'm told I got to slow down and stop and I'll move on, but um Hands off. >>

016[laughter] [snorts] >> Uh without question uh the staff that we have, I've been in this business for 27 years. I've grown up with it with family in the business. I've been around municipal law enforcement my whole life. I can tell you without a question of doubt the staff members and the folks we bring, both civilian and sworn, make what we are great and outserve the towns around us without question. Um what they have done and our team has done this year for major accomplishments is we've seen crime go down from 20 in 2025, and we're trending in 2026 the same. The major categories are continuing to plummet by their efforts, by task force efforts around the area. Um but as we report our stats monthly uh in the in the public safety meetings, we're actually

017seeing that trend continue to track down for 2026, which is tribute to their efforts as well. Um this year another major accomplishment we we increased our community programming. We're able to finally fill one of our administrative positions internally, our admin sergeant, which right now there are about 18 officers participating in programs that we have scheduled for the rest of the year. You may notice that and may see some more presence on our Facebook and social media page. Again, largely in part by a success of getting the right people in the right places. Uh we we reobtained our clear re-accreditation, which is again not a it's not a light lift. It might sound like that, but unless you're sitting back there looking at the policies, getting the proofs, and making sure day in and day out

018we're following the standards and doing it the right way, the best way, you don't get re-accredited just for free. It's something you earn. And finally, I'm proud to say in the next couple weeks you'll be seeing a significant release on our part working with IT. We are about a couple weeks away. I could be days, but we're going to have a public forward dashboard that's going to be available to all of you through the internet through our web page. And that will be I would say real time, but it'll be delayed to about 12 hours behind, but real time is real time as we can provide you with real time stats, real time call logs, arrest logs, activity logs. You name it, you think it, it's going to be out there for you to digest

019and consider. Um we're going to also be mindful of protecting some of that information that we don't want out there. So, we're not going to put who's house we went to for a sick call. That would be something we wouldn't put out there, but we're not going to put who's house we went to for a domestic. But you might see you're going to see all the other things that we could release freely without worrying of compromising anyone's uh you know, freedoms or confidentiality uh will be out there for you to see, digest, and and take a look at what we really do on a daily basis. But again, I know if you're data driven, that's great, but I just don't want you to lose sight of the stats. The stats, what they do out there

020are things that we can't quantify that have more value than any dollar, any investment, or any stat on a piece of paper or or a computer. Uh and that's evident to me when I walk around this community. I I just live down the street, but I'm here. Mayor [clears throat] saw a little league this weekend. I am in town quite more than you might know supporting our town the the the different events and things of that nature. And when I hear this feedback and response from our community about what how they feel about our officers and what they think about us, I'm telling you it's something that I'm very proud of. Um in the budget so, we're here for tonight, um the hard stuff. As you know, I'm requesting additional officer. I'm happy to take

021questions on that later and explain why. Um Brandon did a very good job explaining some of those key points, but I'll talk to you about uh what it means to us on a financial side and what what the future looks like. Uh we have an addition on page two and uh that that price will look large to you, but I'll explain that to you later. That is the addition of about $65,000, which is a re-core LPR contract and associated increases in software uh and contracts that are pretty standard across the board. Um on our maintenance line on page three, we have an upgrade about $4,400. I am proud to say working with Mona and through the manager's approval, we recently upgraded our call recorder, which sounds like a small deal, um but it's not. It's

022something that keeps us uh in line with with best practices. But our call recorder records every radio, every telephone, uh well, should, I should say. Um radio transmissions, hotlines, and things of that nature. So, when someone calls the PD or goes over the radio, um that system was last updated in 2004. The vendor told us that we pretty much bought a Honda Accord and got about a half million miles out of it. Um so, with Mona's approval and and money that we kind of worked intelligently with within our budget, we entered into a 3-year lease, and that's what you're seeing there. Um there is a $10,000 [clears throat] vehicle parts increase, and that's largely in part because of the we did have a gap in time for for for buying and purchasing patrol vehicles between

02323 and 24. I'm glad to say we have bridged that gap, but that is why you're seeing that. We have some older vehicles that are surely in need of parts and repairs. And lastly, on page four, you're going to see that there's a $20,000 increase for what is the final year of our taser lease. That's something that we've been engaged in for the last 5 years for taser 7. The budget page says 10, that's an error on my part, but that's inconsequential. So, I I think also to point out um I'd like you to consider when you look at our budgets, look at our last three to four years when you go through clear minutes. Our lines haven't changed a whole lot. Yeah, overtime has commensurate with union contracts, right? Um our contracts for for

024softwares on page two, which is our contracts and service lines, look, if you buy anything, you know it's up 2 and 1/2 to 5% every single year. Those go up. That's just the way it is. We try to negotiate better terms, um but you're seeing, you know, 3 to 5% average increase on contractual needs on the softwares and print and hardwares that we employ. Um and I I what I'm asking you to do is just consider when you look at it, we have there are some reductions in there. They're not huge. I've made some cuts where I think we can. Um but it's not going to reduce the budget line. It's not going to receive today, but I want you to know that we are doing our best to listen to you. And uh this

025last year I sat back there at that table, and I listened to the council on the night they adopted the budget. Some of you here, some of you were not. And those words resonated with me. Wrote them down. Um this is a hard budget year, hard decisions to make. We need to live within our budget needs, budget We need to balance the wants versus needs, and we need to be financially responsible and and and look at the reality of the situation. I'm confident telling you the budget I presented heeded those words, and I'm happy to present to you tonight and answer any questions you have. What I really like about we went page by page and kind of highlighted where the major increases were or the reductions. Do you mind just No problem. Thanks. There's

026admin. Yeah, without blinking, page one is a $1,500 increase. In total. That's our admin page. Um, what that page consists of is uh, the admin wing include includes some cadet funding for the cadet program, which I'm proud to say our uh, is now back in the works. We're working on putting the policy back together. And uh, all on target for what we hope to be a release of public release for begin collecting applications or interested parties sometime before the school year starts next year. But on that line on those uh, on line 58 uh, 18, which is dues and subscriptions, the major change there is $1,500 and the what's driving that is an increase of our CPCA and Capital Region Chiefs of Police Association C-CRA. We are a member of all the chiefs in Connecticut.

027Uh, well, I should say the CRA members, pardon me. Um, the CRA members get together. We support, we share resources. So, as an example, uh, out there now is a mobile um, vehicle containment system that CRA has paid for. So, we're paying into that to share resources, which include uh, Bearcats and tools and resources that are spread out throughout the region. And if we have a special need, uh, that's where that's where it comes from. So, essentially, we're just paying our subscription to be part of that team. That's page one. All right. Any any questions on administration? Yeah. Everyone's Everyone's good. Uh, records and communications? This one will get some questions, I'm sure. All right. Um, page two contains our records division and our communications dispatchers. Uh, and some of our working contracts that I

028mentioned earlier. Um, the overtime line is increased by the 2.86 uh, percent or 2.5 uh, increase that you have We have through the FOP contract. Uh, on line 5326, there's a $65,800 increase, and I'll explain. Um, prior to this year, uh, as you know or may not know, um, we have an LPR system in town. It's been here since 2020. Um, we are very blessed to have this system. Um, and I can tell you I'll start talking about it and I'll look over my shoulder and each one of these folks will start shaking their heads. This system is one of the most important systems we have in our town as far as the software is concerned. There are 51 cameras located throughout town in about 31 or 35 locations, and you might notice them now

029and then. They're little white cameras that point north and south, east and west at various spots. And what it's doing is we've talked about this with the uh, traffic safety program recently. Um, what they do is they're capturing the license plate as it goes by and cross-checking that versus a hot list, stolen vehicles, wanted persons, missing folk missing parties. Um, alerts. What's really about it as an example is an officer back here who's very aggressive with it. Uh, when he's looking for someone who stole something from Walmart and's got a lead, he is putting that license plate in the system to know that when it comes back in the town, >> [clears throat] >> guess where we're heading. We're heading to Walmart to make sure this individual's not up to no good again. Why you're

030seeing in the budget this year it was not has not been before. This is our last year of the 5-year contract, I believe it is, Mona. And prior to this, the funding source was coming from ARPA for the first 3 years, and we did private duty for the uh, this year. So, next year we need to fund. I stand ready for any questions on that. So, basically, that's that's a new line item in this one because it wasn't in the previous. Right here. That's correct. So, it's a different fund then. Within within 5326 contractual service, that's the bucket we put it into, but contractual service is made up of a ton of different contracts. I'm happy to get into those if you have questions. Uh, and then the remaining $9,100 of this increase is really

031the contractual increase I mentioned in the opening, the 3 to 5% variances, and some upgraded software that's built in uh, that we're hoping to to to come back with to make our place a little bit more efficient. Essentially, that's that's it. We don't have the ARPA money anymore? No. No. Um, I'm curious. So, were you Were you here when when when in that system went in? Yes. So, when it went in, obviously, getting the national money to help with all of that is is certainly an incentive to try out something like this. Tell me about how over the time it's been in service, it's really become to you something that seems critical and and needs to be a part of this budget. Okay, I'm not going to tell you to make sure raise my hand

032if you stopped a stolen vehicle or chased a stolen vehicle out of town in the recent past. >> [snorts] >> Raise your hand if you stopped a car with a wanted person and affected an arrest. Raise your hand if you put an alert in to stop or or interfere intervene with a crime crime that may or may not occur in the future. >> Okay, well, you now you're just raising your hand before you even finish with it. So, let me let me let me say I'm not This isn't a gimmick. I'm just telling you the truth, right? So, essentially, what why it's important to us is because I want you to think about it. Right now, uh, Cromwell, who is next to us, does not have cameras. You're there, stolen cars are free to go,

033come and go from Cromwell and go commit other crimes. If you're a stolen vehicle that is in the system, you come into our community, we are alerted that you're here. There's there's literally no way in and no way out of here with us knowing you've come through town unless your plate didn't get scanned or was behind another car. But for the most part, what it is, it's a crime deterrent for us. And I I can't tell you whether or not the folks who are criminals have come to learn to stay out of our community. >> which towns have cameras or not. I imagine they must have a blog or you know, on Reddit somewhere, but um, Reddit. the the the importance is is that it's keeping our community as safe as any community can be.

034And if you talk to the vendors from LPR, we are the most probably the most saturated LPR uh, community uh, in the state. And I say that's a larger part why we're seeing the reduction in our crime. And when I report my public safety meetings uh, I'm sorry, um, data public safety, we have a criteria called attempt to stop. We can no longer pursue unless it's a violent crime. But on an average basis, again, raise your hands. How many of you have tried to stop a car by a re-correct and it's taken off and left town? I'm not even looking. I know every one of them. For the record on all of these questions, every single officer raised their hand. Uh, this isn't a gimmick. This is This is what it does for us. The

035the camera's not on them, so I just want to make sure that's known. Yeah, got you. And also, thank you for that response. It I I tend to agree with you. That system, from what I understand, it's that what you've been talking about all along, which is these X factors of things that don't necessarily show up in the data, but if it's deterring crime, how are we going to find that out other than the lived experience of officers telling us this is having a positive impact on it. We can't quantify the stolen car that we deterred. We can't quantify the larceny that didn't occur because we were in the right place at the right time, but know that that system puts us in those spots, and it's making us safer. Well, thank you for explaining.

036I I I tend to agree with you on that. Couple of things, Chief, on record maintenance. That that went up quite a bit. Any particular reason why? Sure, that's what I mentioned in the opening. So, um, that went up $4,400. That is the agreement we entered into with the company lease company to upgrade our call recorder. So, the system we had was from 2004, 2006, somewhere around there. Um, it was no longer supported down the back end on software. We were um, and it was time. I mean, it like I mentioned, it's a Honda with 500,000 mi. We got our money's worth out of the last one. So, we are entered into a four a 5-year agree I'm sorry, 3-year agreement, and you'll see that slight increase in next year. So, if I had used

037the existing funds that were there, which I want to say is like 7,500 Let me take a look. 7,700. 7,700. You'll see that in next year you'll see the additional 4,000 on top of that. So, what I've tried to do is use the existing line item that is there and a slight addition to get us the system in place that we need. One benefit that's going to add, and these folks don't even My guys don't even know. Um, we're actually adding a alternate line, so an additional line to our our report room. So, now they'll be able to record their conversations if they choose to, rather than put their body cams up in front of their phone and then have to put this through another system and have it redacted. So, actually have a recorded

038line down there if they choose to use it. So, they choose if they want to record the call or not, but it's an option to make it a little bit more efficient. Some of these other line items here, radio service, cruiser changeover. Was that not budgeted in the past? We had zero. Is that something new, Mona? Uh, I'm sorry. >> What's the Excuse me. You mind sharing the number? Oh, no, that was actually always there, just lumped into radio service. And so, again, because we're doing more detail, you can see the line items. Brian, that's where we've got under radio service, cruisers, Motorola. 5531? Yes. Yeah. What was our last year's budget? Do you know? Uh, last year's I could dig it out for you. This is part of that multi-year contract. >> Brian has

039it. Do you You don't have it? Uh, not in front of me. >> no. Okay. I can tell you. I mean, Oh, totally. >> if I do, I'm going to close a lot of screens. I might not be able to get back. Um, but I can tell you that generally, what this consist of is is the contract with NORCOM, sorry, with Motorola. Mhm. Motorola Motorola comes in and for, you know, several hundred thousand dollars, close to 200, comes in and they take our shelter and upgrade all the components for our three sites throughout town. Something to keep in mind is that we can choose not to do this. We can say we're going to self-insure, but a lightning strike or something goes down, we have water damage and we lose a server, that's on us

040to replace and the contingency funds that I have will have nowhere near be able to replace that. So, this is an insurance policy. Again, it's a 3-year contract we entered into, which I'm estimating that with what we did, Mona, agree disagree, but so saving is minimal. Minimal difference. Yeah, about 15,000 over 3 years is what I think we're saving by entering into the contract. And then there's a backup uh agreement there with Norcom, which is again another radio service, where they come in and anything not covered by Norcom, sorry, by Motorola, and by warranty is covered by Norcom and comes in as an auxiliary. So, combined there, you have those two contracts combined with uh some extra money built in for fees to take cars apart and build cars back up as they come in.

041So, as we take cars offline, we have to pay someone to pull the guts out of them so we can reuse them if we plan to do that. Or if we're buying new vehicles to upfit the cars, that's a place where we can use that funds for that. What's the miscellaneous repairs? With the Exactly what it means. It's just miscellaneous. I mean, it's uh car seat tears and rips and needs to be replaced. Uh console is broken, needs to be replaced. Um you know, um think about like the air condi- I I don't know. Um So, everything like any any any component in the vehicle, not necessarily like brakes and, you know, doing an oil change. But any component like part of the lighting, we have a bad module and then the lights need to

042be replaced or um need to be upgraded. The radio breaks and needs We need to pay for labor to get the radio pulled out and then rewired and put back in. That's It's a little bit everything. Okay. Do you have anything on uh computer trays and [clears throat] displays, Mona, from the past? We have 5,000, but it doesn't tell us what we budgeted for 2025 and 2026. I'm trying to follow you. Oh, for this line here, it would have been that same uh amount. Again, he's trying [snorts] to The indent is being the description where it used to be called other equipment, and now he's being more descriptive explaining that that'd be computer and and displays for the dispatch. Still the same dollar amount. Okay. Yep, I see it. Thank you. What's that, counselor? I

043have a question. Just want to make sure you're done. I'm done. Yep. Okay. Thank you. Um I I think I know the answer to this, but, you know, we're we're looking at other camera systems right now in town. Is there any way to use that Recore system for some of the stuff we're looking to do? Um >> know if it's even option prob- allowed. >> There are several vendors out there. I don't necessarily They mean um the number of cameras we have through the Recore system, um I think if anything, what I would suggest is if we go with this ATSD program, we talked about this council meeting, sorry. We could add to that. Yeah. But I wouldn't look to supplant it. Okay. Yeah, and I would I would think probably a lot of the

044LPRs are on edges of town and stuff like that. It's not a red light. Not a Yeah. >> [snorts] >> Yeah, I just thought, you know, maybe if we already had some in the right spot. And one of the companies said that they do both, but I think there's a question about whether they're even legally able to do that. I'm not sure. Yeah, and I'm sure they're making their money. They're making their money by using their own camera systems, it sounds like, too. So, it's probably not possible, but I don't know. Just thought. Um the only other thing I could say is I guess I appreciate the reduction in the supplies, the office supplies. The office supply Less Less paper. I I was curious about the Honda Accord. Uh the the the There's a line

045item for No, no, no, no, no. It's what >> [laughter] >> The system that's goes back to 2004 that you're replacing. Um is that something that came up anytime in the last 5 6 years as a like we need to do this, we need to do it now, but we ended up kicking it down the road? It's been something that's been on our tar on our radar since I was the in support services, you know, 6 7 8 years ago. Um listen, it was working. It wasn't failing. Uh we just reached the point now where Yeah, we discussed actually Mona and I had a discussion about putting in capital improvements, but the overall cost was less than $22,000. So, it wasn't a huge expense, and we kind of came up with this plan and had

046an opportunity to do it over 3 years and thought that would be better than throwing in the capital outlay. Um you know, but no, I by no means do I think a previous administration or anyone didn't listen. I think it's been more we strategically decided like just hopefully set it, forget it, and if it breaks, we'll figure it out cuz it's not a huge number. Um but with the deal we had in front of us, it was too good to turn down. >> No, absolutely. It It to me, it frankly just demonstrates that you were taking a very careful approach to it, and you got a lot more out of it than you necessarily would have if you had jumped up and down with panic over it being an old system. So, just tells me

047how you approach all of these things. Thanks. >> All right. Thanks. Support. Support. I guess support investigation. >> page uh if I'm being honest with you. Uh 2.5% increase to uh follow along with the FOP uh labor contract. And I don't think there's any other changes on this page. In the digital >> was a slight reduction, but I'm just looking at the uh increases, but Yeah, is the Mona, is the digital version is there something Is everything in there correct? Cuz it's showing a reduction even in under salary, contractual salaries, and stuff. Maybe there's something that got moved to a different section or It does. Under support? Yeah. Yeah, it's like a re- reduction of Yeah, I can I can speak to that that reduction. I mean, hey, I'll take a reduction. I just want

048to make sure it's accurate. Um that line incorporated some DEA expenses. I've since removed our the position from DEA as well. Um and also funds and and um supports uh queries through a system we call TLO. If you want to look up your phone number, your address, your neighbor, um I've been look tracking historicals on that and didn't see a huge need to continue funding it fully like we had. I think my projections I'm kind of lining this budget with what I have for projections this year. So, it just looks like there's some areas where we thought we were going to spend more money on on that, but um haven't over time, so just just making sure. But anybody any any questions? How do you I'm my only question is how do you manage to

049keep meeting expenses down to only $400 a year? That's a very slow roll on boxes of Joe. Uh you know, if I had it my way, I think we could probably consolidate some of these lines to like a single page, but this is the what we've been working with. And to do that, I think you still have to leave the line in the budget, so it confused. Um so, no, do we spend more than $4 on meetings and coffee? Yeah. For sure. Glad to hear. Yeah, wait till the next page. Yeah, yeah, page four food. Yeah, that's I mean, the prisoners eat pretty good, too, so. Um All right. >> Page four? Get on support? >> Yep. All right. Patrol. You're going to notice uh on 5327 under support service line, that's the title, was

050an increase of $6,500. Uh aggregate there was a $4,000 increase, I'm sorry, addition, I should say, to our membership to the computer digital investigations team in Manchester, which we're currently uh not participating in, but we have a We'll be looking to fill that position. It's a part-time um position. You work on a task force where you do computer um forensics, essentially. And so, with that 4,000, we have access to their team, I have access uh to their softwares and um ability to go defrag a computer, a phone. Um you know, particularly we are seeing an increase statewide. It's not because things have changed, but we're seeing cases of uh child pornography popping up. There are now task force amongst the state that are looking proactively for these things and then reporting to us, and then

051in turn when and if we do a search warrant or seize a phone or a computer, we're going to this team to uh to have the evidence pulled out for us. Um and then also there's a small $2,500 increase to that adds to that 65, um which is for an increase in the cost for our the Crest uh emergency response team has risen um their prices for equipment costs and things that they need to do. So, we are part of a regional SWAT team, um where if we need something, we call it's called Crest, Capital Region Emergency Response Team, comes out for us, and we pay into that, much like I mentioned earlier about being a member of CRCOG. This is one of those memberships that we can choose to be in or not, but

052if we don't, we don't have a we don't have a seat on a emergency response team if we chose to put a someone there, and we would not have their team as a first priority to come out to support us in an incident. And you may recall the West Street incident a few months ago, uh if it was that November, December, that was the Crest team that came out. That was our team. We have a member, one of our officers, a sergeant, who's on that team, and uh trained with them, and so it's an instantaneous resource that we need in a matter of, you know, an hour if we had to call them. And essentially, it's our shared SWAT team. Did you want to jump back up to salary for your position? I can You

053tell me. I I don't mind. We try to go in order, huh? You jump around. Is that easier? You want All right. Patrol salary? Sure. Let me just pull out those notes first. Yeah. You can look to the monitor on the side if that helps. Yeah, we're just talking about you talking about the proposed position, correct? All right, yeah. So, you did hear um Brandon speak about the impact that adding folks to our department would have or what it means to them, right? Uh that's the that's their impact. That's what they feel when they're working on the road and having someone next to them to respond to a call, to back up a call. Um I'm not going to base this request based on statistics of how many new apartments we've put in and how

054much our population may or may not grow. You know that. That's real, right? I can talk about that. I've talked about it before. The fact is our town is growing, continues to grow, and we either choose to grow with it or we don't. I'm going to tell you why I think we need the position. It's based more on first and foremost, in 2027, 2028, we have a retirement cliff coming. We have at least five officers that I can won't name, but I can look at my paper, [snorts] who I know are coming up on their their tenure and can start considering their retirement. Late 2027, January, I think is the first one, and they kind of start snowballing from there. I don't have their exact dates. Some are um as an example, we have an

055officer today who could leave tomorrow if he chose to. Um so, there's five people within the next budget and the subsequent 2028 budget that we can see retire and leaving me with a vacancy, which get more about vacancies in a minute. Um but right now, the way we stand with I staffed as we are, um we, since 2022, have run less than fully staffed, meaning not at our authorized strength, 91% of the time. And you're going to ask why that is, and some of that is retirement retention. Some of that is um frankly, what I'll tell you what it is is last year alone, at one point, we had six people out on injury. Ask me how many we have today. Two. All right? Any given time, we have someone offline for your It could

056be short-term, but I'm going to tell you if you hurt anything and go to the insurance company, you're out for a month without even blinking. Um we have an officer who's been out long-term, year and a half at this point, still working through the karma process, and we have one out now. 91% of time, we run with not the sworn strength that we're authorized for, even if we're at top. Now, you ask how much how long have we operated at 42, 41, whatever we've been authorized for? Since 2022, 8%. Only 8% of time, we run with a fully complement of full strength sworn staff working at the same time. And then of that, understand that even if we have that perfect number, we're going to have two or three people out at any given time

057because of injuries, FMLA, um long-term leave, and let's not even get into if I need to hire somebody. We are hiring two officers now going through the background phase, who will go to the post academy provide they pass their background in July. They will not be on the road until April of next year. So, um you know, I can throw at you, and I don't think it's fair, but I will suggest to you that the DOJ and FBI do say that the the the percentage of population should be about 2.4 per thousand, which would say that we should be at 48 of sworn officers. I personally don't like to throw that at you and say that's the reason, cuz I don't think it is. I think we have to look at every town separate and

058differently based on what we do, what we do for calls, and what our actuals really are. What are we really? Um Brandon appropriately accurately mentioned to you that, you know, we have 42 sworn staff. Well, three of those work full-time at the schools. There's not a lot of them I mean, well, I mean, valuable. I already told you how valuable they are that relationship, but as far as the impact on the road for patrol, it's very minor. And so, what I'm asking you for and asking the reason I'm asking you for this officer is I know we have a cliff coming late 2027 coming up in this budget year that we can start preparing for. So, you can offer I I I can tell you that it I I can I've been up here since

059I'm Where was the meeting you looked at today? 20 2027? '07? When I was up here talking about staff? Yeah. Yep. I've been up here since '07 slinging, let's get some more cops and let's kill overtime. All right? What I'm going to tell you is it's not one for one, but there is there is an impact. There is a correlation in putting more officers on the road and a reduction in our overtime. It's not perfect. It's not going to solve that problem. But this year, if you look at our actuals right now on page four for overtime for patrol, this is the first time we're going to probably come in damn near close to perfect on that overtime line, and and you're going to ask why. Well, that's because we only had two people out

060this year, not six like in 2023 when the overtime budget was $628,000. All right? We had a recent change in our schedule, and that has caused, you know, they work the same number of hours for the year, but they're less there's less days on the road. To then I support that. The quality of life here is more than the most important things that I focus on is making sure that our officers can go home, be with their families, and come back in good good mindset, and treat them right because they're going to treat the folks out there right? That way if they feel good coming in. If they're happy unhappy, they're not in a good mood, not in a good space. Work get held over six times this week. Yeah, they're going to be mad.

061They're probably not going to give you the same level of service that we'd like that I hope that they would. And so, I'm asking you to consider funding this position to allow me to get ahead of this cliff that's coming. And if you don't agree with me, by next budget year, you'll have a very easy decision. You can look right at these two folks over here and say, ah, we shouldn't have done it. Ray, don't fill the 43rd position. You have that power. I'd ask you for five cops if I could. I know that's not realistic. But I'm asking to be strategic and think about what our what where we are, and support us to be able to help get ahead of that curve, but at the same time, as Brandon mentioned earlier, give us

062the extra body on the road. Give us the extra cop working days, evenings, or midnights, and as an example, have an impact on overtime. Since the this fiscal year, since um September, we have spent $80,000 of our $400,000 overtime budget on on training to backfill shifts and send people on their days off. That's real. We will spend 25% of our overtime budget this year on training alone. And adding someone to our ranks means that that number comes down. Is it going to be 10,000, 20,000? I don't want to make any promises, but it will have an impact. That's my spiel. All right. Do we have any questions on patrol? Is is the projected um salary for the new position, is that an entry level? Yes. Or Yes. Okay. So, that the next year, that's obviously

063contractual what the entry level would be contractually. Based on the contract and step level, correct. I'll ask the question. Um the position, obviously, you said there and and therefore it affects overtime, but you've also added 25,000 onto the overtime. Would then could we go back to take that 25 out with the new position? My computer's been shotty. Can you just pull the overtime line up there for me, whoever's got control? Yeah. So, we're at 400, looking for 425. With the new position, would you reduce the 425? You know, um I would say this fiscal year, no. Uh and the reason I say that it's going to take me 18 months to fill this position. Um we have to get someone as I mentioned earlier when you started, the two positions I'm working on now will

064go to a July police academy. They will not be out working on the road till April. So, I would say this fiscal year, we should probably leave it alone, and we can reevaluate um for the subsequent. Listen, if that's if that's what I need to do to convince you to go for the cop, take it. Uh I'll So, And then lower the overtime next year and Uh absolutely. You want 25 for the officer? I'll give it to you, but I I but I want to be on the record to say I make no promises. And I suspect, you know, look, we we're just going through that first year of this new contract, uh new schedule, excuse me. And so, we are getting used to trying to figure out ways to do host our training at

065the cheapest and most efficient way possible. And even with that, uh Sergeant Dinavelas, who's back there at the table, he's has a gray head of hair, but he's pulling his hair out trying to do it with the current schedule. And you can see just based on how we track I I we know the number. We we changed our metric uh in our scheduling system so we could know actually how much strength costs per dollar, >> [clears throat] >> and that's a real number. That's not a made-up fabricated. That is real numbers. Um So, I [clears throat] am going to ask a numbers a question related to policing. Um I think the first gentleman who spoke um talked about response time. Um do you feel that Rocky Hill's response time is lacking currently with the amount

066of officers that you have? If I if I felt that way, you would have heard that from day one since I've been here. I think if you look at our CAD numbers, um we don't have that problem. We are we are a small east-west, north-south community. Typical response times for medicals are between three and five minutes, if not less at times. Um so, no, I am not concerned that the lack of adding this officer to the budget means we're going to get somewhere slower. What it What it does mean is that we're we're potentially increasing the number of officers on any given day on that schedule, which may even just bring that response time down. Okay. Uh I have a question about vehicle parts. Why does it seem like it's going to be over budgeted

067uh for this year we're in? You're budgeted 45,000 and you're projecting 80,000. Absolutely, just give me 1 second. Yeah. Your year-to-date, Brian, is at 58. And I know you had a couple of outsourced Is it the water pump situation going on? >> for my one note. It's the one disadvantage to being up, you don't have my desk. So, everything's kind of try to keep it in order, but I'm missing my one sheet. Can't expect you to know every single line item here. I mean, that's there's a lot. I'm hanging in there. Okay, got it. All right. Going back to the start of my tenure as chief in 2023, we did not receive the funding to replace two to four vehicles in that time period between '23 and '24 and 1/2 5. We have since caught

068up to that. But, what that meant was that cars were aging. We weren't replacing the fleet fast enough. And now we're catching up to those costs to older vehicles that still exist within the fleet. We have 15 vehicles that are 9 years or older. And we are sustaining maintenance costs associated with that. With the taser lease, it seemed like that went up significantly in the uh particular reason? Yes. >> projecting? This um this is the last year of a 5-year contract on the taser 7. Um we started this 4 years ago and this is the final year. Um this year, however, I I have been working with Mona to try to help out uh through asset forfeiture. Uh some of them offset some of that, but uh this year I'm not able to do that.

069And so, this is the last year of that, so you will not see that reoccurring next year. However, I will caution you that we do have to How did your meeting go? We do have to talk to taser about what next steps look like. Um that may not be next year right away, but at some point what happens with the tasers is they conveniently tell you they're no longer going to cover them for liability purposes and provide you with legal representation if there is a use of force that goes bad and puts us in a position of probably want to make the upgrade. But, right now we are all set, so it's our last year. We'll probably look at that in, you know, '27, '28, '29 for replacement. So, you only see that cost one

070time here. For this year. That one? 48,000? Yeah, I don't know what future years look like, but that's that's the final year of this 5-year contract. Okay. So, is it is it similar to some of the equipment where you do a 5-year contract, you still keep the equipment, >> Yep. but you're not paying for it anymore, but then they say, "Well, It's not going to So, I think Yeah, so spare you the the model, the original one we went with, it probably took them 10 years to come back and say, "We're putting you on notice. We're not supporting it for the software. We're not going to support it from the legal perspective." And then we were forced to kind of make that change to '26. So, um do I expect that's going to be next

071year? I haven't spoken to Brandon. Brandon, who spoke earlier, actually is our I our liaison with taser, so he had a meeting. Um I hope we're not back here looking for a 5-year contract next year, but uh we'll get back to you when I know. But, this is you if all goes well, I'm predicting correctly, you'll have at least a break on this line for a year. I wouldn't expect to see a an expense on it next year. Increase your you're looking for that new position. I understand [snorts] having extra body is uh good for morale, good for town. I don't know if one body is going to make that much of a difference at this point. Um I think some of the is the town more of a demand is crime up? You've been

072reporting a crime's down. Are calls for service more up? Just trying to get a a read. Yeah. What's going on? Why do we need extra officer? Well, as I said in the new >> Besides the overtime and five possible retires, you're going to replace those anyhow. We're budgeted for those five people. Um what I'm asking for is a strategic position to get ahead of that shortfall. 18 months to fill a position right now. 18 months. And in that time, that means there's less people on the road. Means there's more shifts to fill for overtime. Means that if no one's volunteering, there's more holdover orderings, which affects their livelihoods, their their home lives. And so, I'm asking you to think about make a strategic decision to get ahead of at least one of those five that's

073coming. We know it is. And um you know, look, there are there are things that will that are benefits from that. There is increase in staffing on the road. Means that a guy can take a day off that he couldn't otherwise. Means we might save on overtime and training. Um you know, I'm not going to sit here and say that again, I as I mentioned earlier, I don't want to throw at you out of respect. We know there's more apartments. We know there's more people in town, right? And I don't know we have a measurable increase in in calls to say, "Yeah, that's that's the catalyst." But, it's coming. We know it's there. And it's predictable. Thank you. I've got just a few questions and not really big money ones, so just kind of broader

074things. So, um talking about uh recor. So, it was originally ARPA and then um it was coming out of private duty funds last year. Yes. So, I I guess broader speaking, it's not in this section of the budget. It's under probably like the revenue side or the fund side, but um if we take that out of the private duty funds, then I'm assuming all the the we're still going to be collecting the same broad amount of private duty funds, right? So, does that mean there is something else that would be paid for out of the private duty funds money? I not quite clearly understand, but I would if you're suggesting that we remove it from my budget and place it back in private duty, I have to defer to Mona on that. Yeah. What I

075will tell you is that the folks back here are your second biggest revenue generator in town when they work those road jobs and that money is coming in hot and heavy. Thank you, MDC. MDC and Butler Construction. Um so, do I think that the fund could I don't have the numbers, nor do I have direct access at this point, but could you fund it out of that going forward? I defer to my Yeah, I and I could say potentially, although you know, you don't want to make a habit of using that to to fund certain items. >> and Correct. I mean, if they didn't have that much collection next year, then we're like, "Oh, are we in a a pinch?" and then try to find it elsewhere, but I'd say at this >> Well, yeah,

076let So, let me back up. First of all, I know that the recor system is highly valuable because I have heard the stories of the specific instances um on the return on that investment to the community, including um I think Officer Garcia isn't here anymore, but I ran into him at the Walmart parking lot and where he had gotten a pop on there and inner interceded while they were there while I was coming out with bags. I was like, "Ooh, what's what's going on?" He was like, "Hey, this is a license plate reader popped this up." But, anyway, so um yeah, my question would just be, you know, um what do we typically use that bucket of money for? We can't necessarily Yeah. >> You know, we don't know exactly how much is going to

077be there. Um I'd say, but what we do do is take the first 200,000 and and use it to general fund to offset the the pension benefit. So, we know that they're they're doing fee for service. So, what the fee is then their actual expenses and then to cover that. So, anything excess. So, you know, could they collect and have 57,000 remaining by year end next year? But, they've had a good year if it continued. >> Probably. I I forget what the number I think it was 200 and something year-to-date right now, so That's what the first ARPA out of I mean, the first recor out of it. So, yeah. Yeah. Um What's the year-to-date on that fund? Do you know? I think it's in the fund summary. Private duty fund or the special duty

078fund? I didn't hear the first part. What's the balance? >> account right now? Yeah, I think we're at about 250 the last time we looked, so you know, we could And and keep in mind the 200's going to come off. Okay. That hasn't come off. >> [snorts] >> No, that'll go at year end when we do our resolutions. What about the DEA fund? What's in that account? Do you know? Oh. I did not bring it with me. I think we're at Brian, you and I looked at it just the other day. I think they're at about 200 as well. But, then keep in mind that there's no at this point additional revenue that's been coming in. So, we're kind of letting that sit until [snorts] we decide where it's going. Um Thank you guys for

079contributing to the pension with the 200,000. Getting that money's in, it's a big help. Thanks. Um yeah, I could have sworn it was somewhere in here I'd seen that number at 253 or something like that. 240 something something like that. Um the one question around I I think it's under patrol um holiday pay. This might just be like a the way that it figures out, but um it's it was budgeted in this this year for 118 but it says by the end of this fiscal year we will have spent 150 but we've only spent 63 or 64 by this point. Is that Is that holiday pay Is that for like the special events like Memorial Day or things like that? Or is like how does that How is that holiday pay not part of like

080overtime or just normal salary stuff? contractual Oh, you better do that one. Yeah, I'll defer back to Mona how she Mona calculates this number out for me. The line below is the overtime town events line. That's the line that you were referring to. Okay, overtime time Yes, so then where is it what >> Sure. So holiday Why you're seeing the the variance in the balance change is under the con- contractual rights the officers who work will say on July 4th they can choose to take it as pay or take it as time. All right. So they're going to either put eight out 12 hours of time in their bank or 12 hours of pay or time eight you know, eight hours of time and a half in their paycheck. Those who bank the time can

081either choose to use it down the line or at the end of the fiscal year request a payout and then it gets cashed out and flushed in June. And the end of the fiscal year. So it's just uh accounting mechanism related to the contractual agreement. >> right? All right. Uh that makes sense. Um so uh we have Do we have any vacancies right now or is everybody filled? We have the two, but is that two Are is that truly two vacancies or is that two people that are out for injury or something like that? >> have two people out injury and we have two vacancies. Okay. So we have two people now in background waiting for a seat in July academy provided all goes well. And those are the 18 months out from being able

082to Yeah, give them a letter now they'll start in April. Uh they will be starting to be employed it'll be under our employee as of July when they start the academy. >> But hit the road in April. Yeah, it's like having a newborn that you know, just feeding the whole year. >> have to pay for them. Yeah, I mean we're paying for it, but they don't There's no return on that investment till about April of next year. At least they get more training than ice agents, that's for sure. Um All right. That's That's the only stuff I had. Anybody else have anything? Um during the during the public comment when um it was mentioned that there's obviously an increase in domestic issues and mental health. Are officers given training in that area? Do we have

083officers that have that type of training to deal with those situations? Absolutely. Every um We do have officers that are specially trained in like CIT critical incident response, but um in addition to that when we're doing our on-site training we're doing use of force or firearms um part of those lesson plans is de-escalation. Um so when we're doing training on the mats or on the range and you mean that you know, the first instinct sometimes is to not shoot, assess the situation and then make your decision, but uh also when we go to our recertification on a triennial basis we have discussions on mental health and de-escalation and and the the philosophy on how to you know, use the least amount of force and how to talk your way through a situation that verbal judo.

084So everyone back there I will tell you the folks that I have been at the pleasure to hire uh that's one thing I am evaluating them on when they're sitting in front of my desk and interviewing is um you know, do I think that they can talk that talk in those moments? Second thing is what I want them living next to my mother, but uh that's the other one. But um honestly, so yeah, I mean it's it's something that we are very cognizant of and is wrapped into many of the lesson plans and and training components in uh that we that we do. I just also want to thank you also the the community policing that your department does. I'm at the senior center a lot when we see some of uh you coming in

085quite often and some of the officers. If you have need to call an officer and you see a face that you recognize, that's huge. Especially when senior citizens you get nervous about things. So I just want to thank you all for that and I know that comes from the leadership, but that's a good thing. Thank you all for it. You're welcome. Thank you. Yeah, and I believe there So isn't there Is there a new group um a community outreach group or something like that? I think maybe we had talked to at an event where it was a on a volunteer basis. It was like would any officer I think we talked about it at like the coffee with a cop thing and it it was a volunteer basis, but it ended up being like 2/3

086of officers that wanted to be involved in it. Something like that. >> so recently as I mentioned earlier we were successful in re- filling our administrative sergeant's position which uh Sergeant Nita Velasquez back there uh who kind of spearheaded a to build a team. Mhm. And that team is you know, we're asking for folks who are interested in participating in these events and um as of my last count I think it was 18 events he has on the schedule that they're building and developing as we speak. And so I'm very happy that's one of the benchmarks we've been checkpoints we've been trying to hit here over the years, but getting seats butts in the seats as I mentioned 18 months to get those spots filled. You We need hands and feet and people to do

087these jobs. Um and circling back to why I'm asking, you know, that if we don't have people here things get pushed off, programs sacrifice and we don't have that ability right now. We have 18 I believe it's 18 very motivated people who are interested in getting out and jumping into our events and I think it's been very successful thus far and I'm excited to see what's coming up next. Yeah. Yeah, I did when I think when he gave me those numbers and I I saw well, this is like the vast majority people that volunteered to participate in this. I think it's great. And the last thing I'll add along with you know, just feedback from the senior center. You You were in there collecting a bag of uh prescription drugs the other the other day

088as a drug take back program. No, didn't make any busts in the senior center. Um also just you know, through the campaign last year we talked a lot of people. We knocked on a lot of doors and you know, people have got complaints about all kinds of things. Um you know, the the leaves don't get picked up on the end of a street or or taxes or whatever, but I don't think I spoke with a single person and and Counselor Van Luven knocked on a lot of doors too. I don't think I spoke with a single person that had a complaint about our force. And I think that's a big testament. Not every Not every town necessarily has that same reputation. Um many do obviously, but I don't think I spoke with a single person

089who who had said that they had a bad incident or that they had a grudge with an officer or something. Um and so you know, I I think uh it's I've tried to tell that to just about every officer that I've that I've I've spoken to since then, so. Well, I'll dovetail on that and say a few things. Well, in terms of that it was a non-zero in terms of the number of people who had complaints. But what I also found was that the couple of folks who did have complaints did not have complaints about professionalism, did not have complaints about things that were frankly really direct to your officer's actions. Um in general I also wanted to put a spotlight on what you've been trying to highlight this entire evening which is the human

090beings that are in the back of the room, the human beings that are out on the streets patrolling and doing all of this work. And uh I can recognize the value of adding additional bodies into that group because you're talking about work-life balance, being able to have an officer say, "Oh, I've got something going on with my kid and it just came up. I have to get them to the doctor. My wife can't do it." Being able to adjust schedules, move things around let these officers have their home life. It matters. It matters so much. We require and expect of you a certain amount of professionalism regardless of what you have going on in your day. But that extra, the smile, the little extra breath before while dealing with somebody who might have a lot

091of energy in what they're bringing to your face. Um yeah, that that comes with work-life balance. That comes with knowing that you have a big enough net to capture everything that you have going on. Um and and yeah, there are hard decisions to make in this budget. There are needs like similar needs to what you've asked for in terms of cruisers. We have vehicle needs across this this town. I think of the human services department. They have a need for a vehicle. They have no vehicles. Um so there are a lot of things that we're going to have to make some thoughtful decisions about. But the human element is one that I'm always going to sit there and say there's a value there that you can't always just put in data. I like data. I

092like data cuz it tells you where trends are going. It tells you where things are kind of happening even kind of informs best practices a little bit. But it doesn't get you at the heart of those kind of intangible things that make a community policing force like yours uh as effective as you've been. Thank you for saying that and I'm sure they appreciate hearing those words too. It's uh you know, we are not a Fortune 500 company. We are not the Hartford. We are not Aetna. And we're not driving our metrics on how much money we make or how many tickets we write. Looking at the comments that you hear from the people in the community, looking at the smiles and the comments and the feedback, to me, which we can't put out a chart,

093it's intrinsic, but that's more important to me than any other metric on any of these stat charts. I appreciate saying that. >> To to put a just to put a fine point on it, I've gone back and forth about whether I'd say this uh from this position, but I will say this. Uh a few weeks ago, my my daughter, who's 2 years old, had a medical emergency and the rapidity with what you talked about response times. And then when you said, "Oh, sometimes less than that." I'm like sitting there, "It was less than that." It was a minute and a half, maybe, before the first officer was at my door. And the relief that it was to know that your officers were there, cuz I know that they know what they're doing. They're know they're

094going to take care of the situation. Um yeah. We have a great police department here. And it it's from top down and bottom up. And I really appreciate what you do. Thank you. I'm glad to hear things worked out for the best. >> Yeah. Oh, she's doing great. Um do we capital improvements, do we have anything to touch on there? I think we just >> If we wanted to touch on, we had two vehicles. Just two vehicles. Absolutely. Um I know we meant there's been some discussion about do we need vehicles? Do we need to continue to support the take-home car program? That That's a separate conversation of itself. What I will tell you is regardless of what decision you make funding the current benefit, the way that it stands, we do need to continue

095to grow and keep growing and replacing our fleet. There's a $10,000 overage on parts and repairs on page four. Why? Because we stopped replacing cars in 2024 2023. We hit a pause, financial cliff, financial decisions. Uh we're not approved. And we are now seeing that what happens in a budget when you don't keep this going. I've been here, as I mentioned, and I will brag about it, 27 years, probably one of the longest serving municipal employees in the town at this point. When I started here in 1999, we didn't have assigned vehicles, we still were replacing two or three vehicles a year, because if you don't have enough vehicles, they're running more, there's more maintenance, and you got to throw them out before sooner than we are throwing them out now. So, either way, uh

096what I'm asking for is to you the capital improvement plan to account for it, the minimum of two vehicles per year going forward continuously and in perpetuity. And look, that may change over time. We might be in great shape a year where we can hold back, or we may find that some of our vehicles didn't last as long as we had thought and might have to come out get on a knee and ask for a third, but a two puts two. Ideally, I'd like it to be three, but I understand our decisions and what we have here for a for a budget uh for this year, I'd like two to be considered for the go-forward perspective decision-making um from the council. We haven't budgeted those in the past, Chief. How have you been paying for

097them? I'm sorry. How have you been paying for all the cars that we have? We haven't budgeted them in years. On a line item here. So, dating back to a previous town manager, one before the last one, right? 2016? Yeah, around that time. Um vehicles were removed intentionally from the capital improvement budget. Um at that time, uh Manager Scafe at that time was then leaning on the revenue from the uh extra duty >> Asset forfeiture. Asset forfeiture, too. Uh-huh. That's all before my time. Um what I will tell you is that um you know, we had this bucket of money. So, just staying on on the revenue from uh the private duty. There were cars purchased. Mona will have to speak to that. I can only speak to the last three and a half years,

098but they're 3 years, but um it was the revenue from that account and a mixture of of kept revenue from asset forfeiture. I don't personally recall a lot of cars being purchased out of asset forfeiture by Chief Custer. I think that was kind of a rare event. Um but it's a blend of both, I suspect. So, you're recommending two a year, at least. That sounds like a progressive thought, just having two, you know. Yeah. We got a plan, you know. Listen, two is the minimum. I don't think we'd be in a position where we're asking for four or five, but if we don't continue to replace, Right. we just keep seeing maintenance and cars going down. Um and so, two gets us to a place that I'm comfortable. Ideally, I'd like three, but you're asking

099for responsible budgeting and asking for things we need. I'm not going to push my my luck asking for three. I think two puts us in a very firm position. Thanks. Um Oh, go ahead. I'll go ahead. I'll go ahead. Um with the price of gas going on, and I'm not saying we need to do it right now, perhaps in the near future, is there consideration of electric vehicles being purchased? They go quite fast, I have two. Um So, they can accelerate quickly. Um you know, the repairs might be an issue um until that's kind of modernized a little more, but just just some thoughts on getting electric charging station and instead of fuel. Um well, I can tell you Mona uh wisely has locked in our fuel rates at about three bucks a gallon. Oh,

100our electric bill is going to go up. >> she goes out to bid once a year. So, we're not dealing with the $4. Um I have actually worked with engineering to discuss the uplift for stations and then to see what it would look like. >> Mhm. Um at first, excuse me, >> [clears throat] >> at the first report, we're looking at anywhere from $275,000 for construction costs >> [snorts] >> to get two fast stations. And we we can't if we were to consider doing this, we need rapid chargers. We need the the highest end of highest end. Okay? And that's not even getting into what kind of vehicles would be sufficient for our needs. Um I don't you know, I I like to innovate, but I look around the state and I don't see any

101other departments doing this on a full-time. It might be a a traffic car, it might be the chief's car, it might be an you know, administrative vehicle. >> to do the buses, but yeah, that's a little >> But on an everyday grind, you got to remember two, right? I mean, yes, we'd be backed up with energy, we'd backed up with um generators, but these cars are emergencies need to be there, need to get there. Um you know, and and that's important. And that's where I mean, look, if if I was seeing a trend in other larger departments where it was really catching on, I I'd I'd really pay more attention, but at this point, uh the electric cars don't seem to be really suited for the size and and and conditions that we need. And

102what also I'm fearful about, and I don't have enough to say anecdotal on my part, um but for what I understand from other chiefs in talking, their biggest concern is that um even minor in- minor accidents for some of these cars, based on their age, is going to total them out. Yeah. And the expense to replace batteries is exorbitant. So, you know, I don't think technology has caught up for what we need. I think for passenger service, it's there. Um but again, I'm it's not something I'm not thinking about, it's just at this point I don't think we're there. Yeah, the batteries are last can last a well into 200,000 miles, 200 200k. Yeah, 200,000 miles. So, there the batteries themselves in terms of needing to be replaced, I mean, there's always that risk, but

103they're they're lasting much longer than original. So, but yeah, no, I hear what you're saying and I I can acknowledge all of that. It's it's a larger like if you could give us a Ford um Interceptor, like the Ford uh uh the SUVs, or the Tahoes that we have now, to provide that capability, that size and capability, I I would have to consider. I it would be it would be remiss of even, you know, but right now, we're not there with the cars that are out we can't squeeze Where'd he go? That guy? You're not putting that guy in there. >> Reacher over here is not going to fit in there. I'm not going to go in my Tesla, you know. [laughter] >> He's not fitting in a Tesla. It's not happening. Well, get the

104jaws of life. And and I believe we have I my understanding talking to um the the guys in the garage, like we have a hybrid Explorer or something that has been the bane of everybody's existence. Yeah, but I don't feel like the right type of vehicle for this department. >> they hold Ford stock, but if you bought the original EcoBoost engine, it's been awful. It's been off the road longer than it's been on the road. It's a 6-year-old car with 40,000 miles at this point, cuz it's been through the garage. It's back. It's been running for a month now with no issues, but if that's the first time it's been here for any length Yeah, knock on anything yet. We'll take it. Yeah. Yeah. Um I I I'll dovetail on Melissa's comment and just say

105um that I do love electric vehicles. I love the idea of us getting to a point where they could be good police cruisers. But one thing I constantly think about with electric vehicles is uh the likelihood of an officer getting into an accident versus me driving down the road is a little bit higher, and the catastrophic nature of the fires with those lithium batteries when they happen in those cars, I just I don't think we're there yet. Um this was the toughest part of your budget ask for me when I was looking down at the budget, and you've made it much harder tonight with a very compelling case about a can that's been kicked down the road. And I can recognize that if we're in a good cycle of this for a number of years,

106taking a pause for a year, especially in you said '23, that was a re-eval year on the the taxes, it it kind of This is tough, cuz I had hoped this would be a place that we could look to to get into. But let's presume that we were to go with two vehicles and even commit to the notion of doing every every year. Getting into that cycle, would that mean that the vehicles that you're taking out of the fleet in eventuality have more of a likelihood to be usable by the town in other spaces. I I bring back the human services thing. They could a large SUV that gets stripped out and is more like a like a commercial van. I think that's a fair assumption. I mean, uh >> Or a 6-year-old hybrid, maybe?

107>> [laughter] >> Again, um you know, I can [snorts] re- recall a time when the fleet was at the fleet lot that's parked behind ours when those cars looked a lot more shiny and had less rust on them than they do now. Um I do think that if we have a healthier younger fleet, it certainly would have made uh Guy Scaife really happy. Um you know, you know, the right sizing of the fleet was his was his thing back in the day and he was a man of efficiency saying, "Look, we don't want junkers on the road cuz we've got to pay for them and got to keep maintaining them." Um you know, so I do think would it take a year or two? I say by year two you might start seeing that where

108we can get a car to you with 112,000 versus uh 163. Yeah. And and we don't have to be overly confident about timelines on it. To me it's like in everything we're doing this year, we want to be thinking about the long term. Yeah, I think it's positive. A cycle that gets us into a place where we start to see some other benefits to being in that cycle, you know, at least we should identify that that could be the case. Um but I I appreciate you making a very compelling case about the cars. I really don't like that we've kicked so many cans down the road in the budgets in the past and I don't mean that in a really partisan way. I just mean that there's a lot of things that just get more

109and more expensive and then world events make them even that much more expensive and so when you identify that you've got a problem and you've been careful enough to know that, well, we've really gotten the most out of that Honda Accord that we ever could. Yeah, I I tend to hear you on that. I just um touching on the vehicles just at least one what you know, one last time for me. Um And so two vehicles we're looking at uh I don't remember if it was somewhere but at least Tahoes. We priced them out. I mean, ideally um that's what we're targeting. Um but Ford does have a competitive uh vehicle out there. Um what we found despite the offsetting cost has a little bit more expensive than the Fords. We're getting um larger vehicles

110for larger people, uh a lot more storage space in them and generally the feedback we're getting from our staff is they're much more happy much happier um having being a 6 ft 2 and 1/2 kind of guy, the Ford SUVs while they look big, but if you're in there and you're my size or bigger or comparable, you know, you are a little cramped. It's not the most comfortable experience. >> Especially once you add in all of the equipment and all of the everything. Um in addition to that, you know, what we've seen in the we have lost 10 cars to recalls uh Fords specifically and that means we're putting a car in the garage, it's coming offline and they're just repetitive issues. So, I mean, look, again, I'm not saying which way we're going. I'm

111looking for what we think is the best deal and what best need for for our folks, um but I'm not committed to one way or the other on it. Um but it's something we will look at pricing and see what we can do to to make our fleet better. Yeah, I would just um you know, obviously like uh V8 Tahoe gas mileage, you know, six cylinder Taurus not a high- or not Taurus uh Explorer not a hybrid. Um you know, that's just cost differences and stuff. I didn't know if it was a preference thing or maybe Ford wasn't doing Interceptors anymore or something like that. So, I mean, the reason a lot of departments um Cromwell's going that way, Newington, uh state police, I'm just trying to think of some others around us, but a

112lot of municipalities are going in in in stages or moving to that direction to Dodge and to um Chevy's. >> Yeah. Because Ford has just been letting us down time and time again. Um You sound just like Joe from public works. He was the same thing. He said, "I got to get a Ford." It's like or I got to get a Chevy not a Ford. I'm hearing it from all these different places. Yeah, I know. Um Great. Any any other questions, anybody? Just thank Chief and thank all the officers that came in tonight. >> Thank you for your department. >> Absolutely. Doing a great job. We'll do the best we can. I yeah, I I know you all have hard decisions to make and I appreciate you listening to our our answering your questions and

113and giving us some consideration. I know that we're fighting against other departments and certainly we respect that our community is putting this bill, right? Um there's folks who from the senior center who really going to feel that increase, right? Versus maybe some others don't, but understand that what we're what I'm asking for I think is a responsible budget to allow to continue the services that we've been providing and to do the best for our people back here in the room and I appreciate your time. >> [snorts] >> Thank you, Chief. sincerely to all of you for everything you guys are doing for our town. Thank you. Second. All in favor? Aye. Aye. All right.