MANSFIELD — Keith Porch said Friday morning he is a grateful Mansfield police chief after watching the swearing in of six new officers.
“We’ve been fortunate to get some good candidates to apply, to go through the process,” said the chief, whose department has battled staffing woes for the past couple of years.
“We are definitely excited that our needle is pointed in the right direction with staffing,” Porch said after Mayor Tim Theaker administered the oath to the new officers.
The six new probationary officers — Arianna Marx, Jacob Budd, Austin Walpole, Eric Buchanan, Brandon Swindall and Kathryn Frase — raise the MPD closer to its budgeted number of 87 sworn officers.
“The hiring of these six puts us at 80, but I have an officer that’s retiring in the second week of September,” Porch said. “I do have four additional candidates that are in the hiring process.
“If those four are successful, we’ll be at 83 here pretty shortly,” the chief said.
In March, City Council approved pay increases and retention bonuses for the MPD in an attempt to stave off manpower losses.
At the time, the police department was down to 74 sworn officers, including eight who had just graduated from the police academy and had not entered field training.
The six new officers on Monday begin a 20-week police academy at North Central State College.
“Normally, we send our recruits to the state patrol academy, but because of that academy being full, we (changed) to North Central State College,” Porch said.
Porch told the group assembled in City Council chambers on Friday morning that the new officers will return to the department in early 2023 and then take state tests before filtering into the department’s field training program.
“That (field training) process is about 14 weeks. So to give you an idea, we have about a year of training before they become solo officers (in the Mansfield Police Department),” the chief said.
“We pride ourselves on training and providing the best training we can. It’s owed to them. It’s owed to you as family and friends to make sure that they have the tools necessary to go out and do the toughest job in America today,” Porch said.
“I hope you’re here (for) 40 years of success and hopefully there’s a chief of police standing among you today. At the end of the day, we need great officers to carry that torch,” the chief said.
Assistant Chief Jason Bammann also welcomed the new officers.
“I think now is the best time to get to law enforcement, because this country needs police officers and this community needs good police officers. So I commend you for accepting this challenge,” Bammann said.
