“I’ve had people come up to me and say, ‘I didn’t know Stinesville had a police department,'” Stinesville Town Marshal Mark Crouch said. “Yeah, they’ve had one for years. I mean, years and years. They replied, ‘I never knew that.'”
When Crouch, a retired Bloomington police officer, arrived at the Stinesville Police Department, it was housed in the damp, mildewed basement of the old town hall. Its radios did not work because the office was at the bottom of a hill. Between three deputy marshals and the town marshal, it had one police vehicle. Perhaps most importantly, it had no means of overcoming its annual budget of $805.
Today, the department has three personnel – Crouch and his deputy marshals, Michael Hendricks and Rob Soilleux. Of the three, only Crouch is paid.
Hendricks and Soilleux are required to work 16 hours per month, and Crouch must put in 25 hours a month. In total, the department is expected to work 492 hours per year.
“The past year alone, I figured it up, and between the three of us, we put in over 1,500 hours,” Crouch noted.
The hours are one reason SPD has had low visibility in the past. It is trying to change that by working more with varied hours.
“I’ve tried to be as accessible as I can over there. Most people know where I live and a lot of people know my phone number. They’ll call me,” Crouch said.
In addition to working more hours, SPD has gotten the approval from the Stinesville Town Council to work side jobs and apply the money officers make from them directly to the Stinesville police budget. Officers worked security for an apartment group in Bloomington during the Little 500 and for Ellettsville during the Hilly Hundred. They directed traffic during Indiana University football and basketball games at home, and they work other charity events. Altogether, they are able to bring an additional $5,000 to $6,000 to the SPD budget a year.
“If there’s something that comes up, I’ll be more than happy to talk to people,” Crouch said, referring to the police department’s willingness to work more.
Even so, the agency is not making enough money to meet the cost of operation.
“It’s state mandated that, when an officer is hired on at a department, that he be supplied with a bulletproof vest. We can’t afford it,” Crouch said.
To make do, Crouch has been wearing a bulletproof vest he got while on the Bloomington police force. Hendricks, too, has been wearing an old one. Both men’s vests are several years past the date at which they are supposed to be replaced. Soilleux has no vest at all.
“You’re talking anywhere between $500 and $700 for a vest,” Crouch said, adding that the department intends to buy one for Soilleux soon.
Additionally, the minimum insurance on each of the department’s three squad cars costs $500 – a cost that comes before fueling up, basic maintenance and getting the cars repaired if they break down.
With just those two examples, SPD is already spending $2,000 minimum. That is almost three times its allotted budget.
Other area policing agencies are aware of the financial hardship faced by SPD and have done what they can to help them out.
Last week, The Ellettsville Journal reported that the Monroe County Sheriff’s Reserve Division donated a vehicle it was going to decommission to SPD. The 1995 Jeep Cherokee was the second vehicle donated to the department.
The other car was donated by the Ellettsville Police Department, but it did not come with a working radio.
“So I went to (Ellettsville Fire Chief) Jim Davis, this has been over a year ago, and I asked, ‘Jim, here’s the situation, do you know where we can get a radio donated or at a very minimal cost?’ Davis said, ‘Yeah, I’ll fix you up.’ I had one. I got an extra,” Crouch recalled.
Morgan County Sheriff’s Department Chief Terry Keith recently called and offered SPD spots in the sheriff’s department’s training classes. Police officers in Indiana are required to get 24 hours of training per year and the offer from Keith will help SPD achieve that.
“There’s people willing to help, but I think they see that we’re trying to help ourselves, too,” Crouch said.
To that end, SPD has made two agreements that will help it pay for the cost of fuel.
The first agreement it made was with the Bean Blossom Township Stinesville Fire Department, which possesses its own fueling station, to pay $1 per gallon, cheaper than at a commercial gas station, as long as Crouch keeps a log of the police usage at the pump.
The second is a new agreement that has not yet gone all the way through the process, but is likely to happen. SPD will patrol Washington and Bean Blossom townships, in addition to Stinesville, and serve court papers to residents in those areas in exchange for partial reimbursement of fuel costs.
Today, SPD has a small office in the Bean Blossom Township Stinesville Fire Station. The fire station is at the top of a hill, so its radios work and the room is dry. Crouch still has to store most of the police gear at his house because the office is small, but things have improved.
“I think things have come along,” Crouch said.
As the department moves toward a better future for itself, Crouch said it is trying to help out other area police departments in whatever way it can.
“It’s a way for us – we can’t afford to pay money to give to Ellettsville for their car that they donated, but we can give some time,” Crouch said. He added that the same goes for other area agencies.
Crouch said he hopes to pursue more grants in 2013 to help train himself and his officers with up-to-date standard operating procedures, work better and more cooperatively with other agencies, and build a reputation for professionalism for SPD.
He said he hopes one day the department will be self-sufficient and in a dedicated building with one or two more deputy marshals and a garage.
Originally published in Ellettsville Journal, 2013. Republished here for archival and portfolio purposes.