Police Commission

LACONIA POLICE COMMISSION MEETING OCTOBER 16, 2024 Meeting took place at 2:00 p.m. in the Armand A. Bolduc City Council Chamber, Laconia City Hall, 45 Beacon Street East, Laconia, New Hampshire 10/16/2024 - Minutes 1. CALL TO ORDER Chairman Whittum called the meeting to Order at the above date and time. 2. SALUTE TO THE FLAG Chairman Whittum led the Pledge of Allegiance. 3. RECORDING SECRETARY Executive Assistant Lori Marsh. 4. ROLL CALL 4.A. Chairman Whittum recognized Commissioners present - Chairman Douglas Whittum, Commissioner Frank Mello and Commissioner Scott Davis. 4.B. Chairman Whittum recognized Staff present - Chief Matthew Canfield. 4.C. Chairman Whittum recognized a quorum has been established with three Commission members present. 5. PERSONNEL MATTERS 5.A. Commendations & Awards No discussion. 5.B. Resignations/Retirement No discussion. 5.C. Promotions/Classification Change No discussion. 6. COMMAND STAFF REPORTS  5.C. Promotions/Classification Change No discussion. 6. COMMAND STAFF REPORTS 6.A. Chief - Support Division Chief Canfield advised the following: 1. All of the new cars purchased with last year's budget are on order and are expected to take about four months. We are hoping for December, but more realistically it may be January for them to be outfitted and on the road. 2. Our CIP presentation is on October 24th at 6:30 pm. The Commissioners are more than welcome to attend. 3. They have been busy with a number of grant maintenance items in order to maintain the grants that we have or do close-outs on others. 4. We are in the process of transitioning to the new pistols that were obtained in the last fiscal year and that transition is being handled with firearms training this fall. They have done one full firearms training and there will be another one in the next week. 5. The Accident Reconstruction Team did a full day of training at the Speedway in Tamworth, which was a very valuable training doing skid analysis and critical speed formulas on skid marks. It was very nice of the track to allow us to use the facility for the day for that training. Commissioner Davis inquired if the pistols are different or just upgrades. Chief Canfield advised they are upgrades as far as the fact that they are newer. It's a slightly different pistol, being a Glock 45, so it's still a 9mm, but they have red dot sights on them. The red dot sights are much easier to acquire and to shoot accurately with both eyes open in order to see the target as its identified. 6.A.i. Orders and Bulletins 6.B. Chief - Operations Division Chief Canfield advised the following: 1. They have completed the winter and spring patrol schedule, which was put out to bid and has been finalized. They are now accepting vacation requests for that time period. 2. They are continuing to work on plans for the New Hampshire Pumpkin Festival. 3. In regards to recruitment, we have two new people in backgrounds. We are looking forward to getting those backgrounds completed. Of the four new officers we hired this fall, we are hoping that the three uncertified officers will get into the January academy and the fourth does not need to attend, as he is certified. All four have also completed the in- house training and are now in the field training phase. 4. The recruitment team has done and will be doing events in the next few weeks at St. Anselm College, Husson University and Norwich University, as well as the New England Law Enforcement Hiring Expo in Nashua. 5. The Sergeant ranks are a bit thin right now due to some medical issues and upcoming vacations, but we are looking to cover those shifts with Staff Officers to reduce overtime as a first choice and then it will be covered with overtime.  Law Enforcement Hiring Expo in Nashua. 5. The Sergeant ranks are a bit thin right now due to some medical issues and upcoming vacations, but we are looking to cover those shifts with Staff Officers to reduce overtime as a first choice and then it will be covered with overtime. 6.B.i. Hirings 7. COMMISSION ACTION 7.A. Acceptance of minutes from previous meeting On a Motion by Commissioner Mello, seconded by Commissioner Davis, and passed unanimously, the meeting minutes of September 18, 2024 were accepted as distributed. 7.B. Notice of Holidays - 2025 On a Motion by Commissioner Mello, seconded by Commissioner Davis, and passed unanimously, the Notice of Holidays for 2025 was approved. 8. REVIEW OF MONTHLY ACTIVITY REPORTS 8.A. Department Monthly Activity Highlights Chief Canfield reviewed the Department Monthly Activity Highlights. No further discussion. 8.B. Criminal Investigative Unit Monthly Activity Report Chief Canfield reviewed the Criminal Investigative Unit Monthly Activity Report. No further discussion. 8.C. Budget Reports Chief Canfield advised that as of September 29th we were at 26.92% of the way through the budget year. We are currently trending at 26.78%, which is slightly under. All of the line items look pretty on par, which the exception of overtime. The overtime number is at 45.66% spent. That is not unusual. We typically do overspend our overtime line item every year. This year is definitely higher than it has been the past few years just because we are forced to cover some shifts with overtime to cover for staff shortages. But overall the budget is trending under, so that is on par. No further discussion. 8.D. Monthly Traffic Report Chief Canfield reviewed the Monthly Traffic Report. No further discussion. 9. CHIEF'S REPORT Chief Canfield reported the following: 1. We will once again be participating in the Lunch With A Police Officer program at the Laconia Christian School. Every Friday they have pizza with their students and they provide pizza to those officers who stop up to have lunch with the kids. It's a nice bonding experience between the officers and students, so they get to know police officers as humans rather than just robotic uniforms. We do this quite regularly with all of the other schools. There are School Resource Officers at the high school and middle school, but the elementary schools are all 1. We will once again be participating in the Lunch With A Police Officer program at the Laconia Christian School. Every Friday they have pizza with their students and they provide pizza to those officers who stop up to have lunch with the kids. It's a nice bonding experience between the officers and students, so they get to know police officers as humans rather than just robotic uniforms. We do this quite regularly with all of the other schools. There are School Resource Officers at the high school and middle school, but the elementary schools are all assigned to officers who are responsible for stopping in and making those same connections. 2. Elections are November 5th. We will be ramping up visibility and patrols at all City polling locations. We will have three detail officers combined in all the wards in order to provide some coverage. Election violence has the potential to be ramped up this year as compared to other years. 3. We conducted a three-week enhanced enforcement effort in the downtown area several weeks ago and we will be looking to do another four-week effort very soon. 4. He has been working with the hospital regarding our body worn camera policy and how it integrates with their health care workers and how it can comply with their HIPAA concerns. We have had several meetings, which were very productive and were a very good teamwork environment versus us against them. He was happy those went as well as they did. 5. He would like to recognize Dispatcher Amanda Mountford. She is part of the New Hampshire TERT team, which is a group of dispatchers who make themselves available to assist other agencies in the event there is a need, whether it be a large scale disaster or dispatch centers not functioning. She is on the Board of Directors for that group and she put together a group of dispatchers from throughout the State who were willing to deploy down to North Carolina in order to help assist with the hurricane recovery. The call went out from officials in North Carolina asking for assistance. By the time the request was submitted, they were sufficient for resources down there and they didn't end up being deployed. Her initiative and drive to put this together was admirable. 6. He will be attending an FBI Joint Terrorism Task Force meeting next week in Bedford regarding the upcoming election violence or the potential for it. In addition, the Director of the FBI will be coming to speak to all JTTF members the following week and he will be attending that as well. 7. October 23rd through the 31st is Red Ribbon Week, which recognizes drug misuse and drug prevention in our schools. As such, we will again be partnering with the New Hampshire Army National Guard to recognize this week as part of their Counter Drug Program. They will be conducting helicopter flights over the Laconia High School, potentially the Laconia Middle School, and Laconia Christian School. When the students form a ribbon on their athletic fields wearing red shirts, the helicopter orbits low a number of times, which is quite an experience for the students, and photographs are taken from the helicopter and sent to the schools as a way of building a little excitement and recognition for this week. 8. For the Spidr Tech community engagement for the month of September we sent a total of 1692 messages, which is up 9%. The survey completion rate is at 18.9%, which is down slightly by 2.5%, but is still considered a high completion rate. 9. He is happy to inform the Commission that the overdose statistics are significantly down, having only twenty-eight year to date with two of those being fatals. We are seeing a lot less heroin and fentanyl overdoses. Unfortunately we are seeing a lot more meth, but at least people aren't dying from heroin/fentanyl as much as they used to be. 10. The year to date line of duty deaths are at 113 across the Nation. Commissioner Mello noted he is glad to hear there will be patrols at the polls. He inquired if we anticipate any major problems and Chief Canfield responded nothing that has been highlighted here in Laconia, but certainly this year has had a lot of potential for violence.  10. The year to date line of duty deaths are at 113 across the Nation. Commissioner Mello noted he is glad to hear there will be patrols at the polls. He inquired if we anticipate any major problems and Chief Canfield responded nothing that has been highlighted here in Laconia, but certainly this year has had a lot of potential for violence. 10. OLD BUSINESS No discussion. 11. NEW BUSINESS No discussion. 12. OTHER BUSINESS No discussion. 13. CITIZEN COMMENTS No citizens in attendance. 14. CONFIRMATION OF NEXT MEETING DATE The next Regular meeting date of November 20, 2024 was confirmed. 15. ADJOURNMENT On a Motion by Commissioner Mello, seconded by Commissioner Davis, and passed unanimously, the meeting was adjourned at 2:17 pm.