Unsung Heroes Magazine 2022 | Page 14

“ With that being said , he was instrumental in helping us in the Sheriff ’ s Department after the election , getting his duties transferred over so we could make Pulaski County one of the best Sheriff ’ s Departments in the state ,” Jones said .
Another fellow candidate in this year ’ s race , David Wesley , is staying on in the department , which Jones expressed gratitude for . “ We ’ ve gotten along really well ,” Jones said .
( The fourth candidate , former director of Kentucky State Police Post 11 Todd Dalton , was retired from law enforcement before the race .)
Jones said he has several ideas for the department he hopes to implement when he takes over . One of those is to rethink how patrol areas are assigned .
With Ky . 80 and U . S . 27 crossing at almost the county ’ s mid-point , Jones points out that the county can easily be divided in to north , south , east and west quadrants .
“ I ’ m going to attempt to get the deputies assigned to particular areas of the county , instead of patrolling the whole entire county ,” he said . Currently , when a deputy comes on shift , they are assigned a different area each day , so they are working all areas of the county .

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“ I want to focus on them getting to know the community , and the community getting to know that deputy ,” Jones said . “ My minimum goal is to have two deputies in each district , 24 / 7 .”
But , again , that falls back onto the issue of being short-staffed .
“ Unfortunately , right now our call volume is so much that we ’ re really just running from call to call ,” Jones said . “ ... We answer a lot of calls during the day time , and even the night , and when we ’ re short staffed and all you ’ re doing is going from call to call , you don ’ t have time to be proactive and look for things . I would like to get back to a point where we can be proactive .” He ’ s also looking to increase the number of narcotics officers from one to five . The number of SRO ’ s is going from seven to nine .
Currently , the department has about six full-time and nine part-time officers in court security , and 21 road deputies for patrols .
That ’ s 21 total deputies to cover a county the size of Pulaski – 677 square miles – 24 / 7 . And not every officer is working every day . There are vacations and other reasons deputies need to be off work , Jones said .
For 2021 , PCSO responded to 9,814 calls . By July of this year , they have responded to 6,089 , which means they are well on-course to surpass last year ’ s call volume . Hence the need for more deputies . With that many employees – plus those who work in the Clerk ’ s Office and in transportation – it ’ s important to keep everyone trained and safe .
And safety is in the forefront of the public ’ s mind right now . The tragedy in Allen , Ky ., where three law enforcement officers and a police dog were killed as officers attempted to serve warrants on a suspect , drew the attention of the state as well as the nation .
Although the situation reminded many around the country about what could go wrong in this job , Jones said he and others in the field think about it all the time .
“ The potential for us to get harmed has always been there ,” he said . “ There ’ s always situations we put ourselves in where that could have happened to any one of our deputies .”
He noted that the office serves a lot of domestic violence papers , which can be some of the most dangerous parts of the job .
Jones said he plans on having Major Jeff Hancock , currently the chief

“ I want each one of my deputies to go home at night uninjured , and that ’ s very important to me .”

- Sheriff Bobby Jones
14 Commonwealth Journal - Unsung Heroes - 2022