The Grimes County Sheriff’s Office is considering some structural changes. At last week’s meeting of commissioner’s court, Chief Todd Green presented the departments idea to the Commissioners Court.
Greene says the main goal of the restructuring is to get some help on the streets.
“We have been looking at our rank structure and our work loads in certain areas. And we feel we need to increase our patrol division a little more,” said Greene. “What we are offering is to remove the Admin Lieutenant’s position and make that into a Patrol Deputy position.”
Chief Greene read off only about half of a lengthy list of duties that would be subsequently broken up among the staff. Greene said he had discussed it with the department members and all felt comfortable taking on the extra duties.
However, Commissioner Phillip cox expressed some concerns over the additional responsibilities.
“I have some concerns about being overworked and underpaid. And I have some concerns about the well-being of the leadership of the department about adding those additional duties to an already burdened staff for minimal amounts of money,” Cox said. “I understand it is an attempt to make the department more efficient, but at the end of the day, will it really? I mean, to be quite honest, seems pretty logical to me to keep the lieutenants position that is already there, then come back at some point during the budget process. And then we could certainly talk about additional compensation for your deputies.”
Debate ensued on the topic for about 20 minutes. As far as who would fill the role of the new deputy, Greene said one of their employees is on maternity leave as a possibility, as well as two others currently in training.
The Commissioners approved the new structure changes for the Sheriff’s Office, which will result in one additional patrol deputy for the department.