A modest proposal for El Paso County

[OneGuy67]

Interesting thought. It is being done in Broomfield, where they were a city within four counties until they became a city and a county by voter approval several years ago. The Broomfield PD has two sides to it; one side handles the municipal issues that normal municipal police departments handle and they have a detention side, which handles all the duties that are normally handled by a sheriff's department by statute. Both sides are under the Chief of Police.

Here is the problem with a merge. The Police are municpal officers, hired by the city to enforce city, county and state laws. The sheriff's office by statute is required to handle a number of things such as subpoena service and eviction, jails, etc. and have a secondary duty to patrol areas of the county that are not incorporated into any municipality. As seen years ago with the Arapahoe County/Centennial/Greenwood Village fiasco, municipalities provide more officers per population density than does a Sheriff's office, thus the amount of officers on patrol is greater in a municipality than in unincorporated areas. That is paid for by various taxes (sales, property, vehicle, etc) the citizens of the municipality pay to the city. The citizens in the unincorporated areas pay less taxes overall and the services they receive from the county are reflected in that. When Centennial became a city and began to collect all the various additional taxes, it then contracted with the sheriff's office for law enforcement services and the sheriff's office INCREASED their law enforcement presence in the city limits with additional officers, traffic officers, and the like. It didn't increase its presence in the unincorporated areas. The unincorporated areas of Arapahoe County didn't see a direct benefit from the increased officers working in the incorporated areas of Centennial. They may have seen an indirect benefit as the agency upgraded equipment for all its officers, had more officers on the street to provide backup to the officers working in the unincorporated areas, had more tactical officers, etc. If Centennial had decided to organize its own police department, the Sheriff's office would have lost half of its officers, a lot of money and would have been unable to upgrade a lot of their equipment as the area that would have remained unincorporated and needing patrol officers would have been pockets here and there between the municipalities and out east towards Byers and Deer Trail.

It wouldn't be impossible, but you would have to get they buy in of the citizens who live inside the city limits of Colorado Springs to agree to supplement their cousins living in the unicorporated areas as they pay into the pot differently.

[flan7211]

As long as we get rid of the PD. Sheriff's are at least accountable through election.

[Circuits]

Not gonna happen, and for more than just "petty political" reasons.

Sheriff is a position which exists as a result of the state constitution, and it's the sheriff's job to provided law enforcement for the entire county, counties being the first level of subordinate jurisdictions to the state government.

Police departments exist to enforce local statutes and such created by any lower level of government than a county, which also requires a grant of powers from the state. A municipality does not have to have a police department at all, but large subpolities, like CS, not only have police departments, but their own court systems and large legal codes in addition to those effectuated by the state and the counties.

The only reason there is a combined Denver PD and sheriff's office is that Denver grew to fill all of Denver county, and officially changed its government to that of a "consolidated city and county". Unless CS fills all of El Paso County (EPC), there will be no compelling reason to combine the sheriff's office with the PD, and the city has its legitimate and selfish needs separate from the county until such a thing occurs, if it ever does.

Since there are already subpolities other than CS in EPC, a consolidation like Denver cannot just happen, either, as it would take mergers and annexations by CS of all other local governments in order to take up all of EPC. Unincorporated areas of a county can be annexed by any subpolity that wants to take responsibility for them, but subpolities can only be annexed with their consent.

[OneGuy67]

Just to correct one point of yours, Circuits.

In the City and County of Denver, the police and the sheriff departments are two completely different entities with two different heads of the departments, two different unions who bargain two different collective agreements and both under the Manager of Safety.

The Denver Sheriff's department handle what is necessrily required under statute (court security, operate a jail, process service, impound lot and the like) and since there is no unincorporated areas of Denver, they have no patrol division, no real investigative division (other than for complaints out of the jail), etc. In fact, the sheriff's department has historically been envious of the police department over pay, benefits, certifications, uniforms, and respect. A few years ago, they changed their uniforms to look more like the police uniforms in order to vie for some respect from the public. They lag in pay and benefits compared to the police department. They do not have an elected Sheriff in Denver County; the Manager of Safety is the de facto sheriff and the agency is directly supervised by the Director of Corrections, who is also considered the Undersheriff.

According to their website: "The Denver Sheriff Department was created on December 2, 1902 with the creation of the City and County of Denver. Since there was no need for two law enforcement bodies within the same jurisdiction and the Denver Police Department was already performing the patrol duties in the city, it was decided that the Denver Sheriff Department would only perform the duties as defined by state law; meaning the Denver Deputy Sheriffs would be assigned to the courts and jails. This remains the primary function of the Denver Sheriff Department today."

Additionally, one does not need to be a POST certified officer to work at the DSD, but you will need to be POST certified if you want to work off-duty security.

[Flatline]

As long as we get rid of the PD. Sheriff's are at least accountable through election.

Not to mention that the majority of deputies that I've met have been decent guys, most of the PD is not.

[Aloha_Shooter]

Not to mention that the majority of deputies that I've met have been decent guys, most of the PD is not.

I think Terry Maketa is doing a bang-up job as Sheriff and would have no problems voting him a budget increase but I am disturbed by all these gratuitous slams against the CSPD. One of my Eagle Scouts is now an officer with CSPD and I've never had a bad experience with any of the officers there. Now, I haven't met anything near a majority of CSPD but I'd wager the folks making these generalized negative comments haven't either.

FWIW, I'll appreciate all of CSPD and EPSO as well as the first responders and firefighters until they show me a reason not to and even then I'm sure it'll just be individuals who are jerks rather than the whole department.

[Flatline]

I think Terry Maketa is doing a bang-up job as Sheriff and would have no problems voting him a budget increase but I am disturbed by all these gratuitous slams against the CSPD. One of my Eagle Scouts is now an officer with CSPD and I've never had a bad experience with any of the officers there. Now, I haven't met anything near a majority of CSPD but I'd wager the folks making these generalized negative comments haven't either.

FWIW, I'll appreciate all of CSPD and EPSO as well as the first responders and firefighters until they show me a reason not to and even then I'm sure it'll just be individuals who are jerks rather than the whole department.

I worked EMS in the county for a couple of years and that's just what I saw. It seems that most of the guys in PD who are good have all moved into operations or support. Patrol is who is in contact with common citizens the most.

On that note, I've never had a CSPD officer help with a patient in any way.
I've had several calls where the deputies where helpful and in one case managed to get us consent from the parents (who were defiant with us) to treat the SI daughter, who probably would have acted on her ideations if we hadn't gotten her to the hospital.

There are good LEOs and less than good LEOs on SO and PD, it just seems that the good ones work for SO in a higher proportion.

[jerrymrc]

but I'd wager the folks making these generalized negative comments haven't either.

In my case I lived in CS proper for 10 years and the county for 14. My comments are not generalized but my experience with both is why I said what I said.

[AirbornePathogen]

There's precedent for the idea, sort of. City of Centennial doesn't have a PD of their own, they contract with Arapahoe County SO to cover the city.