Tehama County Sheriff’s Office resuming daytime patrols Sunday
By George Johnston | Red Bluff Daily News
RED BLUFF — The Tehama County Sheriff’s Office on Sunday will restart daytime after a brief break due to staffing shortages.
At this time, the sheriff’s office feels it can safely provide adequate staff for each shift so that its employees are safe and can provide some service to the public during daytime hours.
“So it is not going to decrease the list of calls that we are not going to take,” Sheriff Dave Kain said. “We are still going to do everything on a priority basis, but what this will allow us to do is have the continuity of having our own people respond to calls during the daytime and determine what type of calls need reports.”
The sheriff’s office can do this partly because it has secured additional staff and had people return from long-term injuries or illnesses. Kain said those people returned to their previous assignments, which have allowed the department to move some positions around.
Months before the sheriff’s office suspended its daytime services, it issued a letter informing the public that certain lower-level priority calls would not be handled or handled on a case-by-case basis based on the department’s staffing levels. The sheriff’s office is still in that area.
“We are not out of the woods yet, but we are in a much better position than we were here just a few months back,” Kain said. “I am happy to report that we have filled our dispatch center, which a year and a half or so ago, we were contracted with the city of Red Bluff. So I think we are in a position heading in the right direction.”
At the start of February, the department reopened its main office in Red Bluff for full operations 8 a.m.-4 p.m. Monday through Friday.
Kain said he would be remiss if he did not mention having the minimum staff to move forward is not where the sheriff’s office wants to be.
“For the last two decades or so, the sheriff’s office has been very stagnant in growth,” he continued. “So once we get back to full staff, we are going to work with the board of supervisors to try to get additional staffing to provide additional deputies, reduce our response times to some of the outlying areas and these calls for service so that we can provide the public safety that the county deserves.”
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