YOUNGSTOWN — Youngstown City Council’s safety committee Thursday asked police Chief Robin Lees more questions about staffing, traffic stops and body cameras.

The session continued discussion from a similar meeting last month.

The nearly two-hour Facebook Live meeting Thursday did focus on a new issue — bringing part-time, auxiliary and reserve officers into the department to save money.

Lees said it’s a “moot point” to talk about because the contract between the city and patrol officers says the city has to reach 107 full-time officers before any part-timers can be added. The city apparently is below 107.

Lees said he studied using less than full-time officers, especially retired sheriff’s deputies to transport prisoners, but the “going rate” for such part-timers is $30 to $45 per hour. He said that would create conflict because that amount is “significantly more” than starting full-timers make now.

He said the department would have to provide non-full time officers with uniforms and extensive training. He added that he believes larger police departments have “gotten away” from using not-full-time officers.

He said patrol officers spend four to six months training with a field officer. He also said he believes non-full-time officers are not “up to it” to work in Youngstown’s “intensive urban environment.”

Councilwoman Anita Davis, a retired Youngstown police officer and the chairwoman of the committee, said she thinks it is “insane” when she sees “a police captain directing traffic” because of the hourly rate paid to ranking officers.

“I don’t like seeing our officers doing non-police work,” she said.

‘SOFT’ DUTIES

Davis said her goal is to relieve full-timers of “soft” duties such as traffic control and other community activities. She said Youngstown residents should not be “deprived of” having non-full-time officers working in their community.

Former Youngstown police Chief Jimmy Hughes, committee vice chairman, said he found the $45 per hour figure laughable. “I didn’t get $45 an hour when I was chief of police,” he said.

As for the union contract, Hughes said the 107-officer part of the contract should not be there.

Hughes proposed that human resources company Clemans Nelson & Associates be hired to study how non-full-time police officers are used in other communities.

He said it should be stated that new officers working in Youngstown’s “urban environment” do not come from Youngstown. “They come from the suburbs,” he said. Hiring non-full-timers might bring in people from Youngstown, Hughes said.

Davis said she is “up to here” with “foot dragging” coming from “people who do not want to see change. A change has to come.” Davis said she wants Clemans Nelson to advise whether non-full-time officers are used in Ohio’s larger cities.

Mayor Jamael Tito Brown joined in the conversation at one point, saying he will talk to Law Director Jeff Limbian. Davis and Hughes said they also will talk to Limbian, but council as a whole would have to approve the idea of hiring Clemans Nelson.

Lees said he was an auxiliary officer for two years before getting hired as a full-time officer.

“I’m not against any of this,” he said, saying his responses are just “food for thought.”

TRAFFIC STOPS

Another topic was traffic-stop data Lees provided at the committee meeting a month ago. It did not track certain information Davis wanted, such as the race and sex of individuals questioned during investigative stops.

Such information is needed to determine whether Youngstown police officers are “targeting” citizens based on race or gender, she said.

Lees said that information is not available yet because of the computer-aided dispatch system currently in use. Lees said it will be provided later.

So far, he turned over data on citizens who received traffic summonses. About half of the citizens were minority and half non-minority, which Lees said “kind of reflects our demographics.”

Lees also provided more information on body cameras for his officers, saying the price is $500,000 to $800,000 for the equipment, storage and licensing to outfit 100 officers. Annual maintenance costs would be $60,000 to $90,000.

Kyle Miasek, Youngstown’s interim finance director, advised the committee the police department currently has about $466,000 in unappropriated money as of July.