WAITE PARK (WJON News) -- Waite Park Police Chief Dave Bentrud is taking a proactive approach to make sure staffing needs are addressed before he retires in May.

During Monday night's work session, Bentrud discussed the departments staffing plan and his ideas for the council to consider.

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Bentrud says they've had many new and young officers join the department in recent years, and feels more supervision within the department would help eliminate some "rookie mistakes".

The justification for a fourth supervisor right now is that, in my opinion, we have become a very young department that quite frankly need more supervision not less.

Bentrud says having a fourth boss would not only provide another point of contact for their young staff, but would help take some of the workload off of the departments senior staff who have advocated for this change.

Council member Mike Lindquist suggested they wait until their next police chief is hired.

The new chief will be here in less than four months and they may have a new idea on how to make this work. Maybe they would prefer to have an assistant chief as opposed to another sergeant.

No action was taken as the council wanted more time to consider the request.

The Waite Park police department has 20 full-time police officers including 3 Sergeants, 1 full time Investigator and 1 officer assigned to the Human Trafficking Task Force.

 


 

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