Selectmen Veto Police Department Promotions

 members voted against a proposal from Police Chief Ron Charron that would have promoted several members of the  during a Wednesday night meeting.

Since 2007, Chief Charron said he has been staffing the department with two captains, two lieutenants, and five sergeants. After a captain's retirement opened a position, Charron drafted a proposal to promote a lieutenant to captain, a sergeant to lieutenant and a patrol officer to sergeant. An additional patrol officer had been hired to maintain the current number of staff.

The Selectmen voted 3-1 against the proposal at their meeting Wednesday, with only member Bill Rice supporting it.

Chief Charron said that while the numbers may seem like a lot of supervisors, it is necessary because the police department is a 24 hours a day, seven days a week operation and there needs to be a supervisor—preferably two supervisors—on duty at all times.

“The biggest issue today is that you need to have proper supervision on the road," he said. "You can't have patrolmen in charge of these shifts anymore."

Additionally, Chief Charron said the promotions were needed to ensure smooth transitions when other retirements occur in the future. Charron said he expects a lot of turnover among the ranked positions over the next five years and that without a rank structure in place, leadership issues occur when someone retires.

“It hurts the police department when these types of things happen,” he said.

Still, Selectman Francis Cavaco voted against the proposal, saying, “I cannot support this at this time. I'd rather hire more officers."

Chief Charron said the idea that this proposal affects the amount of patrol officers was incorrect.

“All we're doing is maintaining what we have, but involves three promotions," he said, adding that some people may have been voicing their concerns to the selectmen because of personal issues.

“People come forward from the outside with an ax to grind,” Charron said.

Chairman David Parker pointed out that currently, one of the captains has been assigned to the court in Taunton and his lack of involvement with supervision proves that the department does not need two captains.

“Why couldn't a third lieutenant provide the same leadership that a second captain does?” asked Parker.

Charron countered that that was a special circumstance regarding previous litigation and that at the time that was the best use of that officer.

Following the failure of Chief Charron's proposal, members voted on another motion that would have allowed just the promotion of an officer to sergeant. That also failed, with a 2-2 vote and Bob McClintock and Francis Cavaco against.

Chief Charron had no alternate proposal prepared and said he had come to the decision he presented after months of research. He said he believed this system to be in the best interest of the town.

Charron had no further comment following the meeting.