Sheriff tells Leadership St. Bernard the department is finishing the last of three new sub-stations at parish borders at no cost to residents and continues quick response times to calls for service

Sheriff James Pohlmann told a meeting of Leadership St. Bernard that quick response times to calls for service remains the hallmark of the St. Bernard Parish Sheriff’s Office and the parish remains safe despite the challenge of being located next to an urban area.

The sheriff also said the department is finishing the last of three new sub-stations at parish borders at no cost to residents.

Sheriff Pohlmann spoke to the Leadership St. Bernard program on May 5, where several local leaders and elected officials offered their own perspectives on their departments and the opportunities moving St. Bernard forward.

The program, which is in its second year, is sponsored and coordinated through the St. Bernard Chamber of Commerce and Economic Development Foundation to engage citizens in networking with leaders and identifying needs, resources, and opportunities for St. Bernard Parish.

The course also included presentations by Craig DeHarde with the parish Dept. of Recreation, Councilman Guy McInnis, Assessor Jaylynn Turner, and District Attorney Perry Nicosia. For more information on Leadership St. Bernard visit http://www.stbernardchamber.org/leadership.

Sheriff Pohlmann said there is a heavy responsibility in overseeing a Sheriff’s Office which averages 3,000 calls for service every month and makes 200 arrests per month, as well as running 24-hour a day operations for a prison, communications division and patrol division. “We have a lot to do with 280 employees.’’

The hiring process for officers was also ungraded involving creation of a hiring board made up of experienced deputies who interview applicants and make recommendations he reviews, the sheriff said.

Using a pool of money from FEMA, along with a donation of land along Paris Road from the Meraux Foundation, the Sheriff’s Office is building three new sub-stations at the entrances to St. Bernard at no cost to parish residents.

The building housing the station now on Paris Road has been leased but building the department’s own place on Paris Road will free up the money used for leasing to go toward utilities for all the new buildings, the sheriff said.

Increased training programs for deputies have been implemented, the sheriff said, and through grants the department has been successful in obtaining money used to get its first mobile emergency command post, a patrol boat big enough to be used on the Mississippi River and a deep-water trucks that can used for evacuating residents in a rain storm event.

The sheriff also acknowledged that like elsewhere in the nation, drug abuse – particularly a surge in heroin use being seen throughout many areas – remains a problem and is the leading cause of property crimes. Addicts steal to get money to feed their habit, Sheriff Pohlmann said.

“If you could fix the drug problem you fix the crime problem,’’ he said.

The sheriff has often said he believes in drug abuse resistance programs in schools starting with very young students, including testing on it as part of the curriculum.

He told Leadership St. Bernard that spending money on education on the front end to prevent kids from getting hooked on drugs would be better than paying the costs of incarceration as well as drugs’ toll on society in general once children have grown up dependent on them.

“We know you can’t arrest your way out of the drug problem,’’ Sheriff Pohlmann said. Education and rehabilitation treatment programs are the best chance at a solution, he said.