By Stephanie Barry
masslive.com
LUDLOW, Mass. — Hampden County Sheriff Nicholas Cocchi this week announced the department planned to pull the long-established regional lock-up services for arrestees on weekends.
The announcement was quick, rattling chiefs of police across the region, and became effective at 4 a.m. on Friday. The news went out to police departments on Monday. Some chiefs expressed sympathy over Cocchi’s predicament.
“I feel confident that, if we face a crisis, Sheriff Cocchi will still be there to support us. He works on principles, not personalities,” Holyoke Police Chief Brian Keenan said on Friday, despite that the departments had previously been at odds over foot patrols in that city.
Robert Rizzuto, a spokesperson for Cocchi, said the change was directly attributable to budget cuts, staffing challenges and frequent medical crises that beset incoming inmates.
The cut, following other suspended services, comes on the heels of state Inspector General’s reports critical of funding structures of sheriff’s departments across the state.
They were particularly hard on Hampden County, which had the greatest overrun. The Inspector General cited a $27 million over its $102 million annual budget.
Based on the reports, the Legislature sharply pulled back its funding for these departments. Hampden County’s, which provides services outside the walls of its jails and beyond county lines, took a major hit.
In March, Cocchi announced 50 layoffs and a “roll back” of services in phases. The Legislature had redrawn its definition of “essential services.”
Cocchi said the regional lock-up services — which support police departments throughout the county with long-term custody — fell victim to the new definitions. The service has been offered since 2017 at no cost to local police departments.
“We feel the service is essential but it is not statutorily mandated, and that is the lens through which the Legislature is viewing our work at the moment,” Cocchi said.
“We also felt that our patrols at Union Station and Forest Park, among our other law enforcement partnerships, were essential but those efforts were described as ‘discretionary’ by the Office of the Inspector General, so it’s clear our thoughts and feelings do not determine whether one of our services is ‘essential’,” he continued.
In addition to the regional lock-up services, the sheriff’s department provided foot patrols at Springfield’s Union Station , where petty crime had become rampant, and at Forest Park.
Cocchi also has focused heavily on outreach for substance abusers and helped local police departments with patrols in small towns that were short-staffed, including Palmer and elsewhere.
In terms of other high-profile programs the sheriff established, mounted patrols, including an entire stable, and a marine rescue unit were discontinued. Several horses were rehomed, Cocchi said in March.
Local police officials’ reaction to the suspension of the program were mixed.
Mark Williams, police chief in East Longmeadow, also is the president of Western Massachusetts Chiefs of Police. During an interview Friday, he said the short deadline took him and other chiefs aback.
“We would have appreciated more time, and the opportunity to have a conversation and perhaps, offer some help,” Williams said.
“But no one does regional lock-up better than Sheriff Cocchi, in the state, in my opinion. We’ve been spoiled,” he said.
There are nine communities in Hampden County that will not be affected by the suspension. Those are towns with fewer than 5,000 residents, Rizzuto said.
“The only exception will be arrests originating from Hampden County towns with populations under 5,000 residents, where local police departments have limited detention resources. Those communities include Hampden, Brimfield, Holland, Wales, Russell, Granville, Chester, Blandford, Montgomery and Tolland,” he said.
Williams said the abrupt announcement may put chiefs in a spot, as one budgetary year bleeds into another on July 1.
“We didn’t figure that into our budgets,” Williams said, adding that the change will tax staffing. Paying attention to overnight guests amounts to expensive babysitting that requires overtime.
In Springfield, Deputy Chief Steven M. Kent said the shift may tax the department mildly, but not stretch it so thin that they can’t handle the change.
“We don’t have the number of cells that we used to so that could be a problem on a busy weekend. We also have to figure out a way to feed them,” Kent said.
In Holyoke, Keenan said they retain 24 male cells and four for women.
Rizzuto said medical transports for inmates have fallen on his department. And they look to staff required to involuntarily work 16-hour shifts as a result.
“Those transports require a minimum of two correctional officers to remain with the individual at the hospital, often for several hours. Because every post inside a correctional facility must remain staffed, additional officers are frequently subject to a mandatory hold over on duty to cover those assignments, requiring them to work mandatory double shifts,” he said.
The suspension is indefinite, according to Rizzuto.
He said overnight arrestees on weekends could amount to the dozens, between male and female detainees. Cocchi agreed.
Many insist on being hospitalized.
“Those extended shifts not only generate significant overtime costs at a time when the Sheriff’s Office continues to face severe budget constraints, but they also place additional physical and mental strain on correctional officers already working in one of the most demanding professions in public safety,” Cocchi said.
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