By SYDNEY KENT
The Ossian Police Department voted against moving forward in the hiring process for one candidate Tuesday evening in a 2-1 vote.
Police Commissioner President Caleb Chichester made a motion to pass on the candidate; Vice President Bob Miller was in favor of the potential new officer. Commissioner Jay Esparza was the tiebreaker and said he felt the candidate would not be a good fit.
According to Chief of Police, Kurt Jack, there is one lateral candidate in the hiring process. The commissioners set an interview date for mid-August pending a background check.
The 2023-2024 budgets were also discussed at the meeting. The cost of a possible renovation for the police station was estimated at $79,360.57 for new furniture, flooring, construction work, moving servers, and adding additional security cameras. Over half of the budget is allocated to furniture due to the cost of cubicles. The cost of new rifles was also added to the budget, however, this line item could potentially be removed due to the cost of renovations and a new vehicle. The budget will eventually be approved or denied by the Ossian Town Council.
The department currently owns rifles that are 20 years old and have not been armored since 2016. The rifles were given to the armory to be checked for safety and quality. Jack also requested docks for the watchguard body cameras and stated it was a safety concern to operate without them. The docks sync body cameras and car cameras without the need for officers to manually turn their body cams on when exiting their vehicle.
“You can get hurt trying to get your camera on when you should be able to pay attention to what you’re doing,” Jack commented. The board agreed docks are needed.
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