Westfield Police Chief John Camerota
WESTFIELD- The City Council Sub-Committee for Public Health and Safety met Wednesday evening to receive an update from Police Chief John Camerota regarding the status of the School Resource Officers.
The School Resource Officers had been absent from their posts since students returned to classes from Christmas break. The officers were absent due to police staffing shortages that left the department struggling to fill shifts. To meet the minimum patrol requirements, the resource officers were pulled from their posts at the schools and put on regular patrol shifts. According to Camerota, the resource officers primarily patrolled the areas surrounding the schools to which they are normally assigned.
The Chief was able to announce that the school resource officers will begin returning to their posts at the schools in Westfield over the coming weeks.
“Some of our officers are starting to return to work,” said Camerota, “two officers returned. One of the officers we appointed at our last commission meeting was already a full-time officer, so he was put right out on the street.”
Camerota added that some of the community police officers they had put on patrol shifts may also be able to return to their normal posts soon.
“I’m in my 42nd year and I’ve never had to do this before,” said Camerota, “I’ve never seen staffing levels like this. We’ve had to take emergency measures but hopefully this will never happen again.”
At the peak of the staffing crisis, 18 officers were out of duty. Some were injured, others were on military leave, and a few were attending academies to join other police departments. To keep the shifts filled some officers also had to work more overtime hours, resulting in a strain on the overtime budget. The finance committee granted the department an additional $100,000 towards the police overtime budget to keep the shifts filled to at least the minimum.
“The guys that are on the road every day, that’s the heart and soul of the police department,” said Camerota, “they have to be there.”
Westfield Public Schools Superintendent Stefan Czaporowski was unable to attend the committee meeting, but he left a statement in support of the police department.
“The School Department is grateful for the full-time restoration of school resource officers. I would like to thank Chief Camerota for making officers available as needed over the last month and for his timely communication with me as this situation developed and subsequently resolved,” said Czaporowski in the statement.
The committee voted to remove the item from committee and to report it to City Council.
