PD Editorial: Sonoma County sheriff's deputies' big pay days raise concerns

It was tempting to focus on the $341,800 paid to a single deputy sheriff when Staff Writer Nick Rahaim reported on Sonoma County’s payroll last weekend.

It is, after all, a lot of money for one year’s work. Not Hollywood money. Not pro sports money. Still it’s nearly six times the median household income in Sonoma County.

But we wondered what Deputy Gerald Turney was required to do to earn his wages.

Turney, who is based in Bodega Bay and patrols the Sonoma Coast, worked 2,311 hours of overtime in 2016. That’s an average of 44.4 overtime hours a week, every week for the entire year.

Assuming that deputy sheriffs are allowed to take vacations - and we think that’s a pretty safe assumption - he probably had more than 44 hours of overtime in an average workweek.

Bear in mind that those hours are above and beyond Turney’s regular work shift. And it was the third straight year that his demanding hours lifted him to the top of the county’s payroll.

Turney’s work ethic and dedication to duty appear to be exemplary. But his managers at the Sheriff’s Office need to ask themselves some questions about their deployment of resources and whether it risks the safety of the public - and their employees.

No one is at their peak at the end of a 16-hour work day. In this instance, we’re talking about working 16 hours a day on a daily basis for multiple years.

Turney is hardly unique. Eight of the 10 highest paid county employees in 2016 were deputies and sergeants in the Sheriff’s Office, and each worked prodigious amounts of overtime.

Law enforcement can be a dangerous job, as officers and their advocates regularly remind us. For that reason alone, they shouldn’t be working non-stop.

Hours for truck drivers, bus drivers and airline pilots are regulated - for their safety and the public’s. Working grueling hours once was a rite of passage for medical students. But a sleep-deprived doctor is more likely to make mistakes. So, beginning in 2003, the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education started limiting the number of work hours for medical residents.

Given the choice, we imagine that most people probably would opt for a well-rested surgeon - or a well-rested cop - in a life-and-death situation.

From a budgeting standpoint, paying overtime wages may be more economical than assuming the cost of wages and benefits for another employee. But health and safety should be taken into account long before employees are working more overtime hours than regular hours.

Moreover, it may be possible to provide relief for Turney and some of the other deputies now working upward of 1,000 hours of overtime annually by redeploying other resources or relying more on reserve deputies instead of hiring.

Sonoma County supervisors should give the issue of overtime hours for public safety workers issue careful scrutiny during their budget hearings this summer, if not before.

Staffing and deployment also would be valuable topics of discussion if, as appears possible, there is a contested election next year to succeed retiring Sheriff Steve Freitas. Let’s ensure that the public and our public safety workers are safe.