 Welcome to Shebaugin County Government, working for you. This month, in our look through county government in Shebaugin County, we are going to focus on the Sheriff's Department. With us today, we have Sheriff Lonnie Koenig, and in our half-hour discussion today, we're going to look at the different aspects of the Sheriff's Department and the responsibilities of the Sheriff. So Lonnie, maybe we can start out today by just giving us a little background about yourself and when you first became Sheriff. I started at the Sheriff's Department in 1981 as a deputy, and I was the first female deputy that they had hired at the Sheriff's Department. In 1989, I was promoted to detective, and from 91 to 96, I worked in what is now known as the Multi-Jurisdictional Enforcement Group, or the Drug Unit. And then after I got out of that unit, then I continued with my detective work, and in 1998, I ran for sheriff, and I was elected in November of 1998 and sworn in in January of 1999. So relatively newcomer to the Sheriff's Department, as far as the elected position of sheriff. Yes, relatively. And what were some of the reasons that you decided to run for sheriff? Well, it was an opportunity that I thought I could make some changes, some positive changes for the Sheriff's Department, and it really wasn't like this lifelong ambition that I had had, but I guess really what triggered it was during that period of time my father had died, and my father had gone through his life always doing what I could have done, what I should have done, and never did that. So I never wanted to look back and think, boy, I could have ran for sheriff, and I didn't do it. So you tried it, and now you're sheriff? You got it. Maybe you could give us just an outline of some of your responsibilities as sheriff, some of your duties as sheriff? Well, the Sheriff's position is a statutory, your job duties are statutorily outlined. One of the things that I thought was interesting is that the Sheriff's position predates the signing of the Magna Carta, which was in 1215, and there's some days I feel like I've been sheriff since 1215. But it's a constitutional office. And some of my duties are by statute to care for the inmates in our county jail, to serve civil papers, to provide bailiffs to our courts. We also have jurisdiction in the boundaries of Lake Michigan, and we also have the statutory ability to offer assistance to other law enforcement departments and to request that assistance. I can think back in my younger days, and I can remember when the sheriff was providing meals for the inmates. You're not going back there tonight and cooking dinner for a couple hundred inmates, are you? No, but you know, back in those days, it was always the sheriff's wife that cooked, so my husband will probably be back there cooking tonight. And he knows about this? Yeah. How many people do you have employed in the Sheriff's Department and the different divisions that you have? We have a total of 179 employees. I'm sorry, I'll get that wrong. We have 79 sworn officers and then 99 civilian officers, which encompasses, you know, car washers, secretaries, correctional officers, bookkeepers, accountants. One of the areas that you have in law enforcement in Shebang County is the corrections, and we have our new detention center out on the west side of the city. Could you give us a little back honest to that development and the status of the detention centers right now? Well, the detention center on North 31st or on South 31st Street actually consists of a phase one and phase two, and that was completed in... the whole detention center was completed in 99, and that was a $16.2 million project. Phase one is our Huber and medium security facility, and that houses 157 inmates, and then phase two is our maximum security, which is our sentenced inmates, and that has a capacity to hold 129 inmates. Obviously, the need for jail capacity for a place to put the inmates has increased over the last few years. Yes, it has. Could you just give a background as to the numbers a little bit if you have those? Sure, sure. And I'd also like to add we have a downtown facility, and that has a capacity of 99 inmates. However, we currently only house females, and our capacity for the females is 40, and that's per our staffing agreement with the Department of Corrections, and then we also have a juvenile facility, and we just completed a remodeling project which now gives us the capacity to hold 28 juveniles. I think what's astounding is how much our inmate population has changed. In 1991, our daily average population was 98. As to date, in September, our daily average adult population is 225. And then in 1993, we were average with five juveniles, and now it's average is 13. So it's been a tremendous, tremendous change in the population. I can remember back before we built phase one and phase two of the detention center, we were housing inmates in other counties because of the overflow. We were bulging at the seams in our original facility, and I'm assuming now that we're not doing that anymore because of phase one and two, have the tables turned a little bit where now we have the ability to house inmates from other counties? Yes. In 1998, we were still boarding out because the detention center wasn't complete. Between the adults and the juveniles, the cost of boarding out was approximately $1.4 million. Now, because we have room, we're boarding from other counties, and to date, we've been able to generate a revenue of approximately $249,000 this year in the year 2000. So we went from spending over $1 million a year to generating revenue as income of a quarter of a million. Yes. How close are we? I know we can project how many inmates we have and where we're going with those numbers, but even with the inmates that were housing from other counties, we still are not at capacity for the facilities that we have right now? No, we're not at capacity. So we have some room yet for the next few years as far as, I don't want to say growth, but for more inmates to be housed? We welcome anybody that wants to stay at the county jail. For as long as they want to. Yes. I know it was my first or second week on the job in January of 1999, and the sheriff gave me a tour of the detention center, and it is just a tremendous facility. The people working there are doing an outstanding job. You've touched on your roles and responsibilities with the detention center. What about the area of civil process, that division? Now besides civil process, that is a statutory requirement of the sheriff. They serve all types of civil and criminal papers. They pick up inmates that are want or persons that are picked up on warrants throughout the state. When someone is sentenced to a state prison system, they transport those individuals to that prison system. And many times these people have to come back for hearings, so they go to pick those people and bring them back for court. They transport inmates, because our main facility is on the north side and that's attached to the courthouse, they transport the inmates from the south side to the courts. They also fill in as bail-offs. They do sheriff sales. They do eviction notices. So they just have a multitude of responsibilities, and there's only four people that work that division, so they are very, very busy all the time. So you mentioned 178 employees total in the department for working in that particular area. Yes. I'll be darned. Now you also oversee the patrol division, division as well as looking into criminal investigations. Could you touch on that a little bit? Well, our patrol division consists of their supervisors, but just patrol people, there's 37 patrol officers, and there's six corporals, and the corporals are road supervisors, and they're also field training officers. And we're in a period of time now at the Sheriff's Department. We're going through a tremendous hiring process, whether it be in patrol or corrections. The patrol officers, besides issuing citations, which is obviously what they're mostly known for, because it's not always a positive experience, but they write accidents, and they are the initial officer at all complaints. And then our criminal investigation division, that consists of six detectives and an evidence technician, and he's really the keeper of all the evidence. And our detectives, they investigate a variety of crimes, all deaths, whether it be homicide, suicide, and they also do sexual assaults, burglaries, thefts, any type of criminal investigation they handle. So corrections, civil process, a patrol division, criminal investigations, and you also have a number of special teams that work for you in the department. Yes, we have a SWAT team, a dive team, we have boat patrol, we have bicycle patrol, we have all-terrain vehicle and snowmobile. We'll be darned. Of the special teams, which ones do you see as being most active in the community? Or is it about the same throughout? Well, you know, obviously the snowmobile patrol, that's a seasonal, the all-terrain vehicle, that's basically to get to places that are hard to get to by vehicle, like I recalled not too many years ago where there was a child lost up in Parnell area and they went out to search. Probably our most active special teams is our SWAT team and our dive team. And then finally, I know you've been very proactive on community policing. Could you talk about that a little bit? Well, what we have been doing is encouraging our officers to get out and work with the community. When I was a patrol officer, we weren't encouraged to get out and have contact. You were kind of stuck in that car. And now we're telling the officers, get out, stop at the store, stop at the mini-mart, meet with the people, and do problem-solving together. They attend town hall meetings and village board meetings. We have our officers assigned to a specific area for a long term so that they get to know their area and they get to know the people in the area, which once people get to know the officers, they're more apt to come to them when they have problems or when they have information. And I think one of the greatest examples is Usberg, where they had an issue with a barn and the kids were in there and they were drinking and causing damage. And our department, our officers, worked with the village and they were able to condemn that barn and have it torn down. And then we also have, we're in our second year of the Citizens Academy. And this year is the first year that it's a county-wide Citizens Academy. So Plymouth and Kohler and Sheboygan Falls all send officers who helped and struck along with the Sheriff's Department. And it's really an opportunity for the citizens to see what we do at the Sheriff's Department and at other agencies. And they have input and last night was a session and last night was going down to the range and firing, you know, some weapons. And then we had an interactive, it's called that. And they're able to have a scenario on the screen and it's, you know, whether you shoot or don't shoot. And they've really, really enjoyed that. I've received real positive feedback about that. How do people get involved if they want to participate that in the future? We do it twice a year and they can call the Sheriff's Department and we'll send, we'd be happy to send them an application. Wonderful. Before we move on to one of the larger projects other than the detention center that the Sheriff's Department has been involved in, which is the 800 megahertz communication system, just a couple of related questions to what Adam was asking you. You mentioned before that you spent several years on a MAG unit. And I think there is concern among the residents of Shebang County that we're not getting too involved with drugs and that type of activity in the county. Could you just relate to us a little bit about the activities of that unit and I realize some of the things you can't talk about because otherwise they wouldn't be too effective. Who makes up that unit and how does it work? There are two detectives from the Sheriff's Department that are assigned to it and then there's a city officer, a Shebang Police Department officer and a lieutenant from the Shebang Police Department that oversees that unit. And then from the various departments out in the county as manpower permits they will come and assist. Back in 91 when I started in the drug unit you didn't see like heavy volume of drugs. If you went and you did a search and you had a couple ounces of marijuana you thought you're doing pretty good. When I left in 96 you were seeing multiple pounds of marijuana and that's how it's changed over the years. On an average the drug unit gets approximately 50 calls and unfortunately they are only able to respond to approximately 30% of those calls immediately. The other, they just aren't because they're so busy with now bigger cases. It doesn't mean that that other percentage never gets looked at. They may be able to use that to substantiate some other information and I think the public sometimes in it and when I work there I know they would call and say well I saw somebody smoking on the corner and you just couldn't get to it and there's that frustration on the citizens part but they also have to understand that they are a very, very busy unit with very few people. You mentioned the makeup of the unit being from the county in the city. Obviously the Sheriff's Department has jurisdiction in certain areas of the county not specifically including the city. How does the city police department the Plymouth, Alcarlye, Coller we have various police departments around the county. How do they interact with the Sheriff's Department? What kind of a relationship do you have with them? You know I believe that we have a really good relationship with all the departments in the county and I think part of it is because the chiefs are very cooperative but I think a greater part is the fact that law enforcement is such an important aspect that if you can't get along with one another you just can't do your job correctly so I think we're very lucky in this county to have that relationship. And along with that relationship we have to be able to talk to each other. Right now we have a project that we're in the midst of and it's called the 800 megahertz project. Could you just give us and we don't have a lot of time and we could probably spend one or two shows just talking about all the detail that goes into a project like this and we don't have that time but just a sketch of what this project entails. Well the 800 megahertz project is a six site five tower project. It's a simulcast trunk system and for people that don't are not techie people like me. Let's describe it for me now. What the system is going to do is give us the ability to have more channels for people to be able to communicate with each other better. In our current system which is very antiquated now we have times when it's difficult to communicate with each other so this really is going to give us that ability to do that. And the project involves not only the towers and the infrastructure but also the equipment. Yes and there's approximately 54 different agencies if you will that are involved in this from police to fire to the Sheboygan Transit DPW and that's for ambulance so there's a variety of users in this project. So basically everybody that needs to communicate through 911 calls or responding to emergencies will be able to communicate on the same system with the same equipment and very good. And I know you don't do I believe you said eight million dollar project in one month because it's hard to spend that kind of money in one month but what is the status of the project right now and when do we look for completion of the project? Well one of the biggest issues in the project was the inventory of the radios and when you have that many different entities involved in a project it's always hard to get everybody to agree and so finally after a lot of gnashing of teeth that inventory has been complete and I have to say that although there were some trying times I think everybody worked very well together on it and with the towers the one in 67 we're going to be leasing space there's the Comprehensive Health Center on County Trunk V and that will be erecting a tower there's another tower to be placed on what we call the Vorprop property which is the southeast part of the county and then we have Rocky Knoll and we're going to be erecting a tower there and then the main tower and that quite honestly we're not at the end of a decision on that because we're doing some studies on the tower whether it's feasible to put the equipment the 800 radio equipment on that tower or whether we need to erect a new tower So until the towers are completed we really can't use the system or because it's based that's the infrastructure for the system when do we look for a completion of the project total project I am not going to give a specific date because I know I will do it I'll be held to that we're hoping at some time in June of 2000 but the testing of the equipment really depends on foliage June of 2001 and so since we don't have the towers up we really can't do any testing so we're looking at the middle of the year sometime next year or hopeful as you realize projects like this keep you busy there's a lot of decisions to be made a lot of information to digest and somebody has to do it and you're the sheriff so the buck stops there but maybe you could just talk about some of the things that you feel are some challenges in the coming years as far as the sheriff's department or some of the projects that you think might be coming up well the biggest challenge is the 800 megahertz radio project but also within that project there's two other projects going on and one is our mobile data terminals we have them now but they're old and they're breaking down so we're going to be going to laptop computers and the squad cars and then also we are going to be sharing software and CAD system with the Sheboygan police department and other municipalities throughout the county are going to have the opportunity to join in and really what that's going to do is be able to give officers access to information from the Sheboygan police department or say from Plymouth PD where they can access a name or information from all departments and it's really going to be an asset to all of our officers so basically we are keeping up with the technology I mean a lot of the things we've talked about are technology issues we're improving our technology and our ability to communicate and to function as a department you're going to be starting your second term in a little bit and we're taping this program before the election but I've been assured that you're going to win the election so you're going to be starting your next term in January, your second term are there any, your first term you initiated the community policing are there any new initiatives or programs that you're looking at in the second term? You know because the radio project and the sharing of software with the city you know I'm just looking to complete that project I hope it doesn't take my whole next term to be honest with you but I don't have any really huge projects there's some things I would like to look at as far as corrections we have the electronic monitoring bracelet which you know some of our inmates available to some of them there's new technology out there it's a GPS system where you can track the person I'm looking at that but I'm not willing to take that on right now until we get the radio project resolved we talked a little bit before about the drug unit, the MAG unit and the higher incidence of the amount of drugs that you're finding obviously Sheboygan County has been identified as a good place to raise a family and a good place to live and one of the things that gives us that ranking is a good shares department the police department is in your viewpoint Sheboygan County a safe place to live do you agree with that status? that it's the safest place we don't have to be the safest but is it a place where you feel comfortable with your teenage kids out in the community and is it a safe community? I think Sheboygan County is a great place to live and I think part of it is the people that make up Sheboygan County Sheboygan County is filled with people with great work ethics and I think when you have that that's reflected everywhere in your community and I feel very comfortable raising my daughter here we're almost out of time is there anything that we have missed in the shares department that you'd still like to have our listeners know about? We have a little plug to the people that work at the shares department because even though people will call and say you're supposed to do this I don't go out and serve all the papers or write all the accidents the people from the car washer to the inspector they're all very very important people at the shares department and I don't ever want to lose sight of that and I think some days we forget to so the next time and one of us gets stopped for speeding or for a light out or something like that we should thank that deputy for stopping us and making us aware of what we did wrong That's right because they're looking out for your well-being I'll try to remember that Thank you for being with us today Well thank you In our effort to continue to bring county government to our readers excuse me our listeners next month we would like to highlight the highway department we're coming upon the winter season we you're going to start seeing the snowplows on the road eventually I'm sure the salters all the things that people like to complain about and say why are you getting all the salt on my car but yet if you don't plow the roads I'm not happy either the highway commissioner Roger landing with us and we'll try to discuss the different departments of the highway and the work they do not only in the winter but through the fall and the spring and the summer also again if you have any suggestions for us for this TV show that we put on once a month you could reach any of us at the administrative coordinator's office and the phone number for that office would be four five nine three one zero three and we are welcome to the flood of phone calls that we're going to get and we'd be happy to hear from you and all your suggestions for our program and we'll see you again next month with High Commissioner Roger landing and the highway department thank you