Chief Tusken: Efficiency Check First Before Hiring More Cops

Duluth Police Chief Mike Tusken has been on the job as the city’s top cop for roughly 90 days now, and he’s talking to FOX 21’s Dan Hanger about hard research underway to decide whether more cops should be on the streets of Duluth.

“Are we being efficient? Do we need more resources? If we do need resources, where would those resources go? And that’s this assessment process that has to be done,” explained Duluth Police Chief Mike Tusken.

Duluth’s calls for service are at an all-time high at roughly 105,000 calls for service in 2015, according to Tusken.

Before former police chief Gordon Ramsay left the department in January for a chief position in Wichita, Kansas, he said more cops needed to be on the streets to meet the growing demand of calls and community policing.

“If you want to do traditional policing and just go call to call, you can do that with bare-bone staffing,” Ramsay said in an October 2015 interview with Hanger. “But if you really want to get to the problem and work with people on problem solving and collaboration, you need cops and time to do that.”

But Chief Tusken believes that’s not the case — at least right now – and there’s actually room to be more efficient with the use of new technology.

“I’m new to this job and have a different set of eye,” Tusken said …. “I want to make sure we are operating very efficiently and effectively so technology can help that.  Some of it is an analysis of our work processes to see, do we really need to do some of the things we are doing.”

That analysis, Tusken says, is part of a bigger strategic 3-to-5 year plan being conducted internally and also by an outside consultant.

The goal is to make sure the department is running top notch before asking tax payers for more officers.

“I’m hopeful these processes are going to really hone in and bring me right to where I need to be,” Tusken said.

So far, every employee within the department – roughly 200 of them – has been individually interviewed about what’s working and what’s not working.

“What are our strengths; what are our weaknesses, and what are our opportunities and threats,” Tusken explained.

Those questions will also be offered in community forums to help focus the strategic plan.

“Because … a quarter of the city’s budget is going to the police department,” Tusken said. “We feel we should have input from the citizens.”

But before that can happen, Tusken is banking on a new stream-lined reporting system for officers that is basically a one-time entering system instead of a bunch of time wasted duplicating reports for different departments.

“Our officers get frustrated because they say, OK, so this is the third time I’ve had to write this in a different report,” Tusken said.

Public notices will be coming for community forums on the future of the Duluth Police Department.

Chief Tusken’s goal is to have the final strategic plan by January and then start discussing the outlook during 2016 for 2017’s budget.

Thursday night on FOX 21 News at 9, Hanger will talk with newly appointed Duluth Fire Chief Denny Edwards.