By PAMELA J. MILLER

Medina Post editor

MEDINA - The police department will soon be seeing some more internal changes.

Police Chief Patrick Berarducci is in the final stages of implementing a plan to reorganize the department with the aim of saving money in the long-run. He discussed his proposed changes at both the Jan. 23 and Feb. 13 finance committee meetings. The committee was receptive to the idea, giving him the OK. It still needs final approval during a regular council meeting before implementation.

"We ended last year - which was a very tight year revenue-wise - we ended the year $541,000 under budget," he said. "I think that's a direct result of a kind-of controlled down-sizing of the positions. We're adding responsibilities and redistributing workflow. We're trying to use police officers more to be policemen and less to be bookkeepers or administrators."

The plan is to eliminate job positions within the department, some of which are not currently filled, and replace them with more useful positions. The fulltime records clerk will be reclassified as an administrative assistant, retaining the same employee.

"After reviewing the duties and the job descriptions, it's actually more commiserate with what her duties actually are," Berarducci told council.

Three additional part-time patrol officers will also be added. Eliminated will be the positions of four part-time communications operators, the diversion coordinator, the safe communities grant coordinator, a part-time school resource officer and a fulltime COPS grant position. Some of these jobs were paid for by grants that are no longer available, so the positions weren't filled.

"Some of these positions have not been filled in several years, but the problem is that they are still on the books," the chief said. "We're telling you that we're removing all of these positions. We don't plan to fill them and are asking you to do away with them so that the temptation are not there in the future."

Previous reorganization efforts have contributed to a $1.7 million reduction in requested appropriations and added to the department's surplus. For the first month of 2012, the police department is $54,000 in the green.

"We're saving thousands of dollars in this restructuring, in my opinion. I think that's directly attributable to why we're holding our costs the way we are," Berarducci said.