By Jason Stuart
Ranger-Review Staff Writer
The Dawson County Sheriff’s Office may be on the precipice of a serious manpower shortage.
Sheriff Ross Canen confirmed on Thursday that one of his five deputies has already resigned, having accepted a position with the Yellowstone County Sheriff’s Office. Meanwhile, another two deputies have applications in at other law enforcement agencies and are just waiting to hear back.
Canen, meanwhile, is left in a sort of limbo, not certain if he’s going to need to hire one new deputy or three, and unable to take any action towards replacing the two who might leave until they’ve actually tendered their resignations.
“I can’t advertise (for the positions) until it’s official,” Canen said.
If the other two are hired on at those other agencies, Canen made no bones about the impact it would have on his department to lose three deputies at the same time.
“All three at once, that would be the equivalent of Billings PD losing 75 officers in one day,” he said. “It affects everybody when it’s this small of a department.”
Canen’s workforce problems were compounded further Friday morning. Besides his five regular deputies, he has one “civil deputy” on staff, but they tendered their resignation Friday morning.
Up until now, the DCSO has mostly avoided the high turnover rate and consistent officer shortages that the Glendive Police Department has dealt with for years.
“It’s unprecedented for the sheriff’s office, while the GPD’s been living with this for 30 years,” Canen said.
He lamented that it seems to be getting harder and harder for either local law enforcement agency to keep their officers on staff for very long.
He noted that there are those who do leave for perfectly legitimate reasons. For instance, one of the deputies who has applied elsewhere did so with the Alaska State Troopers, but their family lives in Alaska.
However, he added that the range of complaints and excuses he’s starting to hear from officers who want to leave just seems to get longer and longer.
“It’s tough, and it’s always the same thing ... they want to be closer to family, they want to see trees, they like to see the mountains, they hate our winters, they complain no one likes them because they’re a cop, they say there’s no one to date ... no shopping is another,” Canen said.
He added that the civil deputy who resigned on Friday told him one of the reasons they decided to leave the department was because “it’s getting too dangerous serving papers.”
The most concerning part about it, according to Canen, is just as it’s getting harder and harder to keep deputies around for very long, it’s also getting harder and harder to replace the ones who do leave. In part, he said the blame for that lays with the current national mood towards police.
“Some of this is the national culture. Just look at the news — everybody hates cops,” Canen said.
He said that has curtailed the number of applicants who apply for open positions in his department. Consequently, he said that also translates into fewer and fewer quality applicants who would make good officers.
“The good ones aren’t applying,” Canen said.
He added he does understand why being a law enforcement officer might not appeal to many people, noting that it is a difficult, dangerous job and acting as society’s disciplinarians isn’t exactly a barrel of laughs.
“We hold people accountable, and who likes that? We’re the only agency that holds people accountable, and it’s not fun,” Canen said. “But it can be rewarding, if you let it be.”
In the meantime, he will just have to wait and see whether he only has to replace one deputy, or three at once. Canen, however, said he’s not exactly just waiting around for that to happen, adding he’s currently working out a contingency plan in case it does.
“We’re working on it. We’ve got some Plan Bs, we’re not just waiting for the other shoe to drop,” he said.
Reach Jason Stuart at rrreporter@rangerreview.com.