Huron police changing shift times

HURON — Huron police commanders recently implemented a change regarding how long their officers work in a given shift. During a recent public meeting, city police Chief Terry Graham — who spearheaded this policy — informed council members of this tweak, which involves officers going to 12-hour work days. As of right now, those serving Huron police work eight-hour shifts. Many Erie County-based agencies — namely Sandusky police, Perkins police and the sheriff's office — operate with their patrollers in 12-hour shifts. Huron police has lost officers, either existing or prospective, due to the city's eight-hour workday policy. When comparing a 12-hour workday to an eight-hour workday, in a given calendar year, an officer stands to work the same amount of total hours but has upward of 70 or so extra days off. Graham explained the other benefits: • The legislation: "The city of Huron and the two Fraternal Order of Police bargaining units in the police department, officers and sergeants, have agreed to a memorandum of understanding. This memorandum of understanding is a temporary pilot program to implement changing from eight-hour shifts to 12-hour shifts. The memorandum of understanding was unanimously approved by city council." • The timeline: "These proposed shift assignments will begin Sunday, Aug. 4, and the hours of the shifts will be from 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. and 6 p.m. to 6 a.m. This memorandum of understanding will expire on Dec. 28, at which time the operational and economic benefits will be evaluated. If there are no issues, this new schedule will be continued in 2025." • The staffing: "The department will be divided into four squads and staffed with three officers per squad, which will work on 80-hour biweekly schedules instead of 40-hour weekly schedules." • The reason: "This new proposed schedule should improve our retention and recruitment efforts in addition to providing more coverage of officers on shifts."