Can someone please explain to me why, after months of my asking, the Office of the Bureau County Sheriff finally held a meeting of the Bureau County Sheriff’s Merit Commission on 18 December, 2009, in the office the Sheriff? And, as an outcome of that meeting, job announcements for the position of Deputy Sheriff have been published for the first time in years. The first thing that you should know is that the Sheriff’s Merit Commission does not BELONG to the Office of the Sheriff. In fact, if you visit the Bureau County Sheriff’s website and look under the tab entitled “Employment Information” you will read that the Merit Commission is “a separate entity of Bureau County Government”. In a nutshell, the Merit Commission has the responsibility to provide the Office of the Sheriff with a list of qualified applicants for a job as a Bureau County Deputy Sheriff/Dispatcher and identify those members of the Bureau County Sheriff’s Department who are eligible for a promotion. Please do not read anything into what I say as any thing negative about any employee currently working at the Bureau County Sheriff’s Department. Rather this is to give you insight into another example of the “Chief Law Enforcement Officer” of Bureau County picking and choosing which statutes he wants to abide by. A review of the Bureau County Budget in regard to the Merit Commission will reveal that the annual budget includes such items as Publication of legals, Testing applicants, Polygraph, and Physical exam. A further exam will reveal that for the years 2008 and 2009, the Merit Commission spent $0.00 for publication of legals, $643.00 for testing applicants ($58.00 in 2008 & $585.00 in 2009), $0.00 for polygraph tests, and $158.00 for physical exams($0.00 in 2008 & $159.00 in 2009). Yet, during that same two year time span, the Office of the Sheriff hired 10 full time employees and 7 part time employees. The staff of the Bureau County Sheriff’s Office are a group of hard working individuals and I want to stress that I am not taking anything away from them. The Office of the Sheriff has placed itself above the wishes of the voters of Bureau County and the guidelines as established in the Illinois statutes. Just asking if the timing of this meeting could be for political purposes?

One of the invaluable assests that a law enforcement agency can have is a K9 team and the Bureau County Sheriff’s Department can count itself lucky to have not one, but two K9 teams. However, when a department initiates a dog section it automatically increases its vulnerability to law suits. One of the primary precautions that is normally taken is to ensure that the patrol car being used is marked with a warning so an individual would know that the K9 dog was in the car. Recently I was made aware that one of the marked patrol cars from the Bureau County Sheriff’s Department was being used as a K9 patrol car, however that car had no warnings posted on it. The unit number of that patrol car is S6-17. As you are aware, I am a member of the Bureau County Board of Supervisors and one of the committees that I sit on is the Buildings and Grounds (B&G). At the B&G meeting last night, 6 January, I attemped to find out when the K9 car would have the warnings put on. The Sheriff became visibily agitated when I asked him. He very curty replied that, although I had the right to ask that question, he can choose not to answer it. He did tell the committee members that the K9 cars being used by the Bureau County Sheriff’s Department were all marked. As I stepped out of the courthouse after the meeting, unit S6-17 drove by me with a dog in the back of the car and it had no warning markings on the doors. Either the Sheriff is unaware of what happens within his department or he chose to provide the committee with a statement that was less than accurate. The question about when the K9 unit will be marked is still on the table and any one of you might ask the Sheriff when this will be corrected. Hopefully you will get an answer and in a much more civil manner. You might also ask him when the windows in the back of unit S6-17 will be tinted to provide a humane area for the K9 dog. Although that is not an issue at the present, it most certainly be when summer arrives.