What Cumberland County is doing to address a shortage of detention officers, deputies

Cumberland County's sheriff hopes raises included in the county budget will help relieve a shortage of detention officers and deputies.

Detention officers will get a $2,710 raise in their annual pay, while deputies receive increases of $2,780. The raises are in addition to 4% cost of living adjustments for county employees and bring the entry-level pay to $40,457 for detention officers and $44,000 for deputies.

“I’m hoping that’s going to do some retention and help with recruiting,” Sheriff Ennis Wright said Thursday.

The raises go into effect July 1.

County Manager Amy Cannon told county commissioners in budget documents that some local government officials are conducting studies to look at how much law enforcement officers are paid.

“Management continues to monitor the compensation market for law enforcement in conjunction with our high turnover in the Sheriff’s Office,” she said.

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Wright said he appreciated the efforts by Cannon and the commissioners to get raises for the deputies and the detention officers.

The Sheriff’s Office is authorized to have 180 detention officers at the jail. There are about 95 working there now, Wright said.

Cannon said the turnover rate at the detention center can cause the facility to have a vacancy rate among officers as high as 56%.

Wright said detention officers have to be patient and be willing to work in the jail for 12 hours at a time.

“It takes special people to work over there,” he said.

The Sheriff’s Office has about 50 vacancies among its authorized level of 332 sworn deputies, Wright said.

Schedules had to be adjusted for detention officers because of the shortages and some have had to work overtime, Wright said. Some deputies had to move to different units when needed, he said.

“We’re slowly getting there,” he said. “It’s going to take a while to get back.”

Recruiting law enforcement officers is difficult in light of the George Floyd case and the COVID-19 pandemic, Wright said.

Floyd, a native of Fayetteville, died in Minneapolis police custody after an officer knelt on his neck. His death sparked protests across the country and calls for budget cuts to law enforcement agencies.

COVID-19, which is caused by a highly contagious coronavirus, killed more than 1 million in the United States, including more than 660 in Cumberland County.

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Wright said he is thankful when young people choose law enforcement as their profession.

“It’s going to come back,” he said.

Law enforcement, like any profession, has bad folks who need to be weeded out, Wright said. He said he tells his deputies that if they see their partner or someone else doing something wrong, they should report it.

“That’s what we do,” he said.

Wright said he knows some people have lost respect for law enforcement.

“We’ve got to earn back that trust,” he said.

Law enforcement officers are held to a higher standard, Wright said.

“Your integrity, if you lose that in this job, you’re no good as an officer,” he said. “The public has to have their trust in you.”

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Wright said deputies have to be willing to put their lives on the line.

“Law enforcement is a calling,” he said.

The Sheriff’s Office is now running its first law enforcement academy, Wright said. The 22 cadets who will start the academy in July will get training and learn how the office works, he said.

“Then we don’t have to compete against another agency,” he said.

Separately, there are 10 other Basic Law Enforcement Training graduates, whoare in field training and will finish by around August, Wright said.

Wright said he told the cadets who will start next month about the raises on Thursday morning.

“They were excited about it,” he said. “It makes people feel you care about them.”

Local news editor Steve DeVane can be reached at sdevane@fayobserver.com.

This article originally appeared on The Fayetteville Observer: Cumberland County raises pay for detention officers, deputies