Another law enforcement shortage, this one in California's rural-ish Central Valley

Melissa Gomez reports today for the Los Angeles Times reports today from Merced County, population 281,000 under the headline, "‘Folks, it’s bad’: Merced sheriff warns of public safety crisis as deputy vacancies mount."  Here's an excerpt referring to Sheriff Vern Warnke: 

Warnke said the vacancies have mounted in recent months and his pleas to the county Board of Supervisors to increase his budget and give him control over how funds are allocated have gone unheeded.

At this point, just four deputies patrol the county’s nearly 2,000 square miles during daytime shifts. A lieutenant and two sergeants are covering dispatch shifts. If someone calls in sick, colleagues are asked to work beyond their 12-hour shifts. One dispatcher clocked more than 700 hours of overtime over the course of a year.

In a video, Warnke says: 

Our correctional bureaus are understaffed and overworked. Our patrol deputies are understaffed and overworked. Our communication center with the dispatchers — it could be to the point when you dial 911, we have nobody who can answer it.  And that’s not a joke. It’s not a threat. It’s a fact.

* * * 

Merced County, known as the gateway to Yosemite, has a larger budget than many rural counties because it encompasses both farmland and cities such as Merced, population 90,000. The county’s annual budget for public safety has grown in recent years and makes about $93.4 million available for the sheriff’s office, according to county officials.

But Warnke said it hasn’t been enough to retain deputies, who are leaving for other counties despite Merced’s $10,000 signing bonuses. Top deputies in some neighboring counties make at least $102,000, while Merced pays its top deputies $90,000.

The sheriff acknowledged that the competition for salaries and bonuses creates a “vicious cycle.” The department went through similar shortages during his first term, and deputies received a 20% raise in 2017. But here he is facing the same problem.

Here's another quote from Warnke: 

The issue is that the county doesn’t seem to want to put any planning into the future. They’ll put a Band-Aid on something and think it’s gonna hold for a long time. And it doesn’t.

A prior post about the shortage of deputies in Tehama County is here.  This week, Capital Public Radio in Sacramento reported from Stockton, about an hour north of Merced, that the City of Stockton had hired ten new police officers.  Here's a story by the same journalist in 2017 when the city was looking to hire 50 new officers.