Police chief warns staffing gaps raise overtime, highlights grants and equipment needs

Police Chief Bob Aronowski presented the department’s 2025–26 priorities to the council on March 2, highlighting staffing pressures, grant support and equipment needs.

"We currently budgeted at 33 sworn police officers and we'll probably stay there for the next budget year," Chief Aronowski said, noting three officers were in the academy with graduation scheduled in May and an additional field‑training period of roughly four months.

The chief said the department answered about 119,815 calls for service (54 per day) in the year referenced and that enforcement activity rose after reintroducing a traffic officer. He said the department used grant funding for community resource and school resource officers — Garden City Schools contributes approximately $150,000 for two SROs — and that other grants (bulletproof vest, body‑camera/Axon funding, MIDC judicial resource officer grant) help offset recurring costs.

On overtime, council members asked whether hiring an officer is more cost‑effective than current overtime expenditures. Aronowski said a newly hired officer’s fully loaded near‑term cost (salary plus training and time in field training) can approach $120,000–$200,000 when accounting for training and overlap, and that overtime patterns are influenced by injuries, retirements and recruitment timing.

Chief Aronowski also reviewed equipment priorities: he recommended maintaining in‑car and body cameras and replacing tasers as they age; he asked to restore the patrol vehicle fleet toward 14 vehicles to avoid operational gaps; and he said the drone program recently received a beyond‑visual‑line‑of‑sight authorization (COA) that enables more in‑house drone use for first‑response work.

Aronowski outlined federal equitable‑sharing (asset forfeiture) proceeds as a modest supplementary revenue stream (typically about 10% of net proceeds for cases in which the department participates) and said proceeds are restricted to law‑enforcement uses such as training and equipment.

Council members requested a breakdown of overtime versus the full cost of a new hire; the chief offered an initial estimate and said staff would produce more detailed figures for council consideration.