BRANDON — The town has hired a new police officer, and may hire a couple more relatively soon.
The Select Board was formally introduced to Officer Mikayla Fontana at its regular meeting on Monday.
“I had the opportunity to meet here and visit with her the other day, and I’m very, very happy to have her on board,” said Select Board Chair Doug Bailey. “This is the first step of our rebuild.”
Once her field training is complete, Fontana will join Chief David Kachajian and Officer Ethan Kelleher in the Police Department.
Over the winter, the town lost most of its police officers to other departments. Officer Aidan Alnwick joined the Middlebury Police Department in January, while Officer Kevin Rimmer, Officer Nicholas Stendardo, and Officer Joseph Mannino all resigned and joined the Rutland City Police Department. A month later, Officer Michael VonSchleusingen went to work for the Ludlow Police Department.
Town Manager Seth Hopkins said in a past interview that a number of officers mentioned having to be on-call as part of their reason for leaving.
Alnwick had been the Brandon department’s dog handler. The dog went with him — Middlebury bought the dog from the town — and according to Hopkins there’s little appetite on the board or within town administration to restart the police dog program. Hopkins said Wednesday that several times over the past few decades the police department has brought a dog on only for the cost to become too large. Hopkins said because there is no specific need in Brandon right now for a police dog program, it’s unlikely to try and restart one.
Kachajian said Monday that Fontana attended the part-time Vermont Police Academy in Pittsford and is presently in field training.
“And our hope is that as soon as she’s done with field training, she’ll be on the road in a solo capacity, and you’ll be seeing her out patrolling the streets,” he said.
Bailey said the police department is eyeing two other candidates for officer positions.
“I’m not going to say any more than that. That’s good that we’re working towards getting our police department back,” he said.
Hopkins said Wednesday that Fontana is a Level II certified police officer. This would be her first time in the role of a patrol officer, he said.
He said that should the town ultimately hire the two candidates Kachajian recently interviewed, it will have all of the officers it has budgeted for, that being Kachajian and four officers. Prior to the resignations, the department was budgeting for Kachajian plus six others, its largest roster on record.
Hopkins said of the two candidates that one has no previous law enforcement experience and is seeking to become a Level II officer, while the other wants to be a Level III certified officer. The latter works in the law enforcement field but does not work for a municipal department.
Once all budgeted positions are filled, said Hopkins, some officers will still be on-call depending on how the schedule is worked out.
“It’s 24 hours of coverage, but it’s not 24 hours on-duty,” he said.
Right now Brandon is being covered overnight by State Police, said Hopkins.
He said that having 24-hour coverage by Brandon police without an on-call system would require about 10 officers, which is far more than the town can afford.
As a Level II officer, Fontana is being paid around $32 an hour, said Hopkins. The starting pay for Level III officers in town is $34 an hour.
In March, in order to attract new police recruits, the board decided to increase the pay scale for police officers. Hiring and retaining police officers had been a longtime issue for the town, as it is for many small departments across the state.
keith.whitcomb
@rutlandherald.com