During the lengthy question and answer session between committee members, the commissioner and senior DPS staff, the reasons cited for the department’s struggles included a long list of items.
“We can’t increase patrols because we only have so many men,” Mafnas said.
He cited an exhausted gas budget, only four working patrol cars, lack of technology to track criminal investigation cases, Finance personnel not signing purchase requisitions, lack of senior staff, old facilities, inadequate minimum mandatory sentencing laws and insufficient administration staff as reasons for DPS’ operational challenges.
Committee members seemed skeptical however, and specifically requested him to submit supporting documents to include a “needs list,” “vehicle inventory” and a “detailed master plan” for future consideration.
Mafnas did not say if he would provide the requested documents.
Fact check
Variety compared DPS-Saipan to the police departments of Guam and Kauai, Hawaii, two other Pacific islands that are dependent on tourism.
The specific items compared included growth/decline of police officers’ salary, overall police budget, overtime as a percentage of total budget and police per capita ratio.
Variety purposely excluded Saipan’s Fire, Training, Boating Safety, Criminal Justice Information System, Motor Vehicles and Administration Divisions for the most accurate analysis possible.
To achieve an apples-to-apples comparison, actual approved budgets and staffing data was collected from Guam’s Special Programs office and the Planning and Research section; Kauai’s data came directly from Assistant Police Chief Begley during telephone conversations with Variety.
The DPS-Saipan budget/staff breakdown came courtesy of the House leadership office, as did assistance in identifying key line items that ensured a meaningful comparison with Guam and Kauai.
Summary
DPS-Saipan beat the national averages and Guam and Kauai in the areas of overtime as a percentage of total budget, total salary budget and police-to-population ratio.
Due to one line item irregularity in DPS-Saipan’s budget worksheets, the total 2012 budget figure rests somewhere between -1.58% and +11 percent; a huge range that was unexpected.
Fact check 1: DPS is poor
DPS-Saipan’s 2012 approved total budget for salaries (commissioner, police & investigation) vs. 2011 expenses reported in the budget worksheets, amounted to a 3 percent reduction, but that figure distorted the bigger picture.
When the 2011 and 2012 total personnel expenditure columns were compared (salary & benefits minus austerity reductions), the net personnel budget actually increased by 14.9 percent.
Other government department personnel budgets were not so fortunate due to the 16-hour pay cuts and unpaid holidays absorbed by workers.
In contrast to DPS-Saipan’s double-digit increase, Guam’s 2012 approved salaries budget shrunk by 2.3 percent, while Kauai’s total rose slightly by 0.5 percent.
Total budget
According to the Police Executive Research Forum’s 2010 survey, 51 percent of U.S. police departments suffered budgets cuts on an average of 7 percent.
Evaluating DPS-Saipan’s total budget (commissioner, police, investigation and administration sections), was trickier due to a line item titled, “All Others (Budget only),” listed in the commissioner’s worksheet at $488,634.
If this “Other” amount was excluded from the 2012 figure then the total budget decreased by 1.58 percent from 2011.
However, if the “Other” amount was included in the 2012 budget calculation then there was an 11 percent increase over 2011.
Regardless of whether DPS-Saipan’s total budget contracted by 1.58 percent or increased by 11 percent, these numbers stand in stark contrast to “non-critical” CNMI government agencies that experienced severe austerity budget cuts of up to 20 percent.
For perspective, Guam’s total police budget inched up by a miniscule 0.2 percent, while Kauai’s total grew 7.8 percent due to healthy government revenues.
Overtime
The accepted national standard for evaluating a police department’s overtime expenses is calculated with a simple formula: OT as a percentage of total budget.
The current national police benchmark stands at 6 percent.
Again, depending upon whether the “Other-$488,634” was included the OT range was an increase between 12.9-14.58 percent; at least double the national standard.
Kauai’s OT was slightly above the norm at 7.2 percent, while Guam came in way under at just 3.45 percent of OT vs. budget.
Fact Check 2: DPS is understaffed
The benchmark for assessing law enforcement coverage in a U.S. community is the police-to-population ratio (or per capita) of 2.3 police officers for every 1,000 people.
DPS-Saipan listed 113 sworn officers on its 2012 budget worksheet (although approved staff was listed at 95).
When 113 was divided by 48 (2010 US Census counted 48,222 Saipan residents), the island’s police-to-population ratio was 2.35; slightly above the national average.
When the officer number of 95 was used the ratio declined to 1.98.
Either way, Saipan’s per capita police ratio surpasses Guam (1.9) and Kauai (1.92) respectively.
Fact Check 3: DPS planning has improved
Beyond the seeming mismatch between DPS’ public statements and the actual numbers, the commissioner’s testimony before the House JGO vommittee raised other questions about their planning capacity.
The commissioner emphasized the problems with patrol car fuel and repair/maintenance expenses as a major obstacle to operational effectiveness.
Yet, the 2012 budget line item amount approved by the governor for “Fuel and Lubricate” remained empty.
Additionally, the line item “Repair/Maintenance” had zero money allocated.
Reaction = Questions
Variety shared the 2012 DPS-Saipan police budget and recent testimony of the commissioner with a security expert for reaction and received an overview as well as questions posed as comments.
There is no question that police chiefs are battling lean budgets and are pressured to do more with less, the consultant explained, but the professionals he works with realize the “public’s very low tolerance for excuses” as everyone — government and families — has to be more creative in this terrible economy.
Specifically on the issue of vehicle fuel and repair/maintenance problems, he wondered why the police chief did not fight for 2012 budget money “to solve the department’s most obvious operational problem” and instead “waited until the problem went critical” before he challenged the government to find a solution; especially since the island’s economy hinges on tourism and crime directly and indirectly affects visitors.
“Any good leader fights like a dog for his troops and his department — otherwise he’ll never earn their respect; or the public’s either.”
