ASHLAND – Ashland City Police Officer Aaron Kline came to the Ashland County Commissioners’ meeting Thursday to pose questions to the county leaders about the future of dispatch for both the city and county.
Kline said he chose to attend the meeting after reading an Ashland Source article from a tour that city and county leaders took of the Ashland County Sheriff’s Office dispatch center Tuesday.
In the article, commissioner Denny Bittle was quoted as saying he felt it would be a waste of time for him to meet with Wayne County and Wooster officials about the possibility of creating a larger regional dispatch center to replace the Wooster-Ashland Regional Council of Governments and bring in Ashland and Wayne Counties.
WARCOG currently provides dispatch services for the cities of Ashland, Wooster and Orrville, while each of the two counties have their own dispatch centers.
“I guess I’m asking you why that would be a waste of time, if there was something that could save the county money and everybody could be on the same page?” Kline asked Bittle.
Bittle responded by saying he has been working on this issue since the day he got elected, first trying to get the city to stay in its previous arrangement with the county and then trying to bring the city back after the formation of WARCOG.
“I tried to stop it, to no avail … At that point, I did agree with the city,” Bittle said. “The sheriff was non-cooperative, there’s no doubt about it.”
Bittle said the city should have taken a more active role in dispatch oversight before problems arose and the sheriff”s office should have reacted better to the city’s concerns.
“Both sides screwed up, and that’s why we’re where we are now,” Bittle said.
Now that WARCOG has been in operation a couple of years, Bittle said, “they have not shown they can save money, and they have not shown the operations management is any better than what we have.”
So Bittle feels it’s time for the city to come back and try again to make things work with the county.
Kline argued that the city rejoining the county’s dispatch could result in a situation similar to the one that caused the city to leave in the first place. With the county sheriff’s office having sole oversight over the dispatch center, Kline said, city police and fire personnel felt their complaints were not being addressed.
“If we’re going to go right back to that, you can promise, promise, promise, but if there’s still one guy in charge of it, in my opinion it’s going to end up the same way … In my opinion, it can’t go back to exactly how it was,” Kline said.
“This is our livelihood. This could save my life. This could get me killed.”
Bittle said he understands and shares Kline’s concerns.
“I have the same concerns as you do, 100 percent,” Bittle said. “How’s the sheriff going to handle this?”
Bittle said the county and city are discussing the formation of an oversight committee that would review both complaints and major decisions such as hiring of a dispatch director. The committee would have no direct authority over the sheriff but would make recommendations for the sheriff’s office regarding dispatching operations.
“The review committee will be a public meeting. It won’t be behind closed doors,” Bittle said. “So if I don’t get along real well with the chief of police and you don’t get along real well with the sheriff, as those conflicts arise in a public meeting, I think those kind of go away.”
Bittle added that he wants to form an arrangement that will not work for a just few years but stand up over time, when circumstances and elected officials change.
County commissioner Jim Justice said he believes Kline hit at the heart of the issue that the county and city need to work out.
“Here’s the crux that I see,” he said. “It is the governance board and how this is going to work … If we have a good governance board that’s open and can cooperate and we find a mechanism that does that, then I think this is a doable deal.”
Justice agreed there is blame to go around and said he would rather look ahead than look back.
“I’d like to see it move forward and solve some of these things we’ve been complaining about and bury the hatchet and fix what went wrong,” he said.
Bittle thanked Kline repeatedly for attending the meeting and offering insight. The commissioner also encouraged Kline to stop by or call him any time.
“I think it’s really important for you to continue to ask questions and have input, because you’re seeing something that we don’t see,” Bittle said.
Kline suggested the commissioners go to the city police and fire departments to meet with other officers and first responders who use dispatch every day.
Kline said he felt the discussion went better than he expected.
“I want it to be back in Ashland, but I want it to be right,” he said.
