Dracut police fear deficit’s impact on department
DRACUT >> Dracut police officers of every rank “are definitely afraid” of what the imminent budget deficit of perhaps $3 million could do to their already bare-bones operations.
That’s according to Selectman Joe Dirocco, who chairs the board’s Public Safety Subcommittee. That panel met last week with Police Chief Peter Bartlett, Deputy Chief David Chartrand and about 20 other officers.
At the Jan. 23 selectmen’s meeting, Dirocco warned that existing staff shortages put police officers at risk. “Sometimes it’s just unsafe,” he said.
Dirocco added, “We’re hoping the need to cut them is not going to happen.”
Dracut, with an estimated 2022 population of 32,060, has far fewer sworn police officers than Chelmsford, with an estimated 2022 population of 35,906. Dracut has 45 sworn officers and Chelmsford, 56.
At the same time, Tewksbury, with a population of 31,000, has 67 sworn officers, according to the numbers Dirocco provided selectmen. Billerica also has 67 sworn officers, but its population is 41,319.
Bartlett has pushed for increases to Dracut’s police force for the last several years. Right now, four candidates are enrolled at the Police Academy and are more than halfway through their training. He is now getting another class of four ready.
Sometimes, Bartlett said, he can put only two police cruisers out on the streets of a town that is 21.6 square miles with borders of Tyngsboro to the west, Methuen to the east, Lowell to the south and Pelham, N.H. to the north.
The budget deficit for fiscal 2025 has been forecast since last spring and with more deficits predicted in subsequent fiscal years. The deficit projection in the spring was $2.2 million.
At the time, increases in net school spending requirements, which are set in Mass. General Laws Chapter 70, were the reason. Since then, inflation has put more pressure on the town’s fiscal condition.
During Town Manager Ann Vandal’s report to the selectmen, she identified one cause for hope in the upcoming budget. That hope is the decline in enrollment in the town’s schools. That would lessen the burden of net school spending requirements.
On the other hand, she pointed to a 10% increase in the enrollment of Dracut students at the Greater Lowell Technical High School. That enrollment change represents 46 more students at GLTHS and a $500,000 hit to the town budget.
And Vandal indicated the deficit could be $3 million once she gets final reimbursement numbers from the state.
According to the Massachusetts Department of Education, the 2022 per pupil cost at GLTHS was just over $23,500, far more than the Dracut Public Schools’ per pupil cost of $13,827. The cost of education at a technical high school is far greater than that of a town school district.
At a previous meeting Vandal pointed to a 25% increase in the cost of trash removal. She told selectmen at the most recent meeting that she is negotiating with Republic Services to bring that increase down.