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Shane Hernandez, the Republican lieutenant governor nominee and Port Huron resident, met with St. Clair County Sheriff Mat King and Sanilac County Sheriff Paul Rich Friday to discuss challenges facing law enforcement today.

King and Rich said one of their largest challenges is recruiting enough law enforcement officers to fill their ranks. It's also a challenge to retain officers that otherwise might be lured to other larger, more urban departments by the promise of better wages and benefits.

"My number one priority right now would be training staffing that wants to stay and live in our community," Rich said.

Rich said retention is especially difficult for his rural department, which doesn't have the budget to compete with the wages of larger departments. They spend tens of thousands of dollars to equip and outfit new officers, only for them to leave.

While the St. Clair County Sheriff Department offers a pension plan to road patrol deputies, most departments don't anymore. A pension can usually only be collected from a specific department, but other retirement plans such as 401Ks can move with the officer, taking away an incentive to stay with one department their whole career, King said.

Rich said the public sector can't compete in wages and benefits with private sector jobs. King said a possible solution is to create a federally-funded pension program for law enforcement officers so that departments can focus more of their budgets on wages.

King said another factor contributing to the staffing shortage within law enforcement is a loss of respect and interest in the profession from the general public in the last decade due to negative media attention of a few bad police actions.

Republican governor candidate Tudor Dixon's plan slates $1 billion in funding for public safety over four years. Hernandez said this would be drawn from the state's general fund. Although it was not clear where the funding would come from in the general fund, Hernandez said in years past the state has had a surplus and they'd be able to find the dollars for the effort.

The plan is designed to provide incentives to retain and recruit new law enforcement officers, firefighters and EMS professionals as a way to alleviate staffing shortages and increase public safety.

The plan includes:

Hernandez emphasized public safety as the root of a thriving community.

"If we're gonna talk about jobs in our community, or affordable housing in our community, or education in our community, none of those can happen without a safe community," Hernandez said.

Dixon's agenda points to a reported rise in violent crime in the few years prior to 2020.

According to the FBI's Unified Crime Reporting database, from 2019 to 2020, the violent crime rate in Michigan jumped from 438.6 per 100,000 to 478 per 100,000, compared to the national rate of 380 to 398.5 per 100,000, respectively. That is the highest violent crime rate the state and the nation has seen since 2010, when crime was 493 for Michigan and 404.5 for the nation per 100,000.

But from 2016 to 2018, the crime rate stayed relatively stable between 460.9 and 452.5 per 100,000 in Michigan, according to the data.

King said violent crime is on the rise the past couple of years, and pointed to a rise in repeat offenders and violent incidents such as two kidnappings and one attempted murder this year.

King also said the rise of methamphetamine as the predominant drug of choice breeds violence. St. Clair County faces special challenges in policing the illegal drug trade due to the two interstates that begin in the county, as well as an international border and two cities within drivable distance that draw drug dealers to sell their product.

"Violent crime is absolutely on the rise," King said.

King said in 2019, prior to the pandemic, the St. Clair County Sheriff Drug Task Force seized 104 weapons and 107 grams of methamphetamine, compared to 304 weapons and 3,774 grams of methamphetamine seized in 2021.

"Meth and guns equal violence, there is no doubt about it," King said.

In 2020, the most recent year for which data is available, there were 113 violent-crime incidents and 140 offenses reported by the St. Clair County Sheriff Department to the FBI's UCR database. In 2019, there were 130 incidents and 148 offenses, compared to 2018, with 211 incidents and 247 offenses.

The Sanilac County Sheriff Department reported 30 violent-crime incidents and 38 offenses; 24 incidents and 34 offenses in 2019, and 44 incidents and 52 offenses in 2018, according to the FBI data

Violent crime statistics for 2021 and 2022 were not immediately available by either sheriff department.

Contact Laura Fitzgerald at (810) 941-7072 or lfitzgeral@gannett.com.

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GOP lieutenant governor nominee meets with county sheriffs to discuss public safety issues - The Times Herald