7994-R1_MechanicFalls_20-21_AnnualReport_Text_4C_Web

POLICE DEPARTMENT

2021 was a very difficult year of re-building. We began the year down one officer as Officer Letarte chose to leave the Law Enforcement profession. As we began our search for a replacement, Officer Chasse chose to resign his position and take a job with the Oxford Police Department. Sergeant Daigle decided to relocate to another state and took a Sergeant’s position with the state that he moved to. Officer West chose to take a position that opened with Androscoggin County Sheriff’s Department and Officer Gagnon decided to follow his friend and former co-worker,

James Daigle, moving out-of-state. Officer Gagnon took a position with the same agency that Sgt. Daigle did. Every one of them were excellent people who did great work here in Mechanic Falls. I enjoyed working with them and respected the time and effort that they put in while they were here. Now it was time to rebuild! With much support from the Town Council and staff members, I was able to start that process and hired on a new sergeant. Sgt. Paul Schroeder came aboard from the Auburn Police Department. He started here with three years of Law Enforcement experience and to date he has been doing a superb job with this department. Sgt. Schroeder is a resident of Mechanic Falls. Stg. Schroeder and I together have been able to hire another Mechanic Falls resident, Michael Rioux. Officer Rioux will attend the Maine Criminal Justice Academy in January 2022 with an expected graduation date in late May 2022. We look forward to Officer Rioux’s graduation. I want to thank the citizens of Mechanic Falls for their patience and understanding and for their words of encouragement during this very stressful and difficult period. I truly appreciate all of you who have taken the time to stop by and offer your support. Last, but not least, I want to offer thanks and gratitude to the Androscoggin County Sheriff’s Department for their help and patrol coverage during times that we could not cover calls during our rebuilding. They have done an outstanding job and helped us out while being stretched thin themselves at times. The Mechanic Falls Police Department responded to 3,122 calls for service; this number is down significantly from our pre-covid numbers. I suspect that in the next year or two we will be back into the 4,000 range, where we were prior to the Covid-19 pandemic. Overall crime was down last year. We covered 94 crashes and conducted 509 traffic stops. Traffic complaints remains one of our highest citizen complaints. Many residents call to complain about more motor vehicle traffic on their streets. We try to respond and conduct traffic observations and stops when we receive complaints.

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