Small wonder Johnson County can’t hire new deputies, with election-denying sheriff

Johnson County Sheriff Calvin Hayden is scheduled to meet next week with county commissioners to discuss ongoing budget and staffing struggles in his department.

“We cannot hire deputies fast enough,” Hayden told commissioners earlier this year. Officers are quitting because salaries are too low, he said: Cities pay more, with easier work conditions. Mandatory overtime in the sheriff’s office isn’t helping.

Oh, and the media are to blame, too. “We’ve been villainized by the press and a lot of other people,” Hayden said in June.

Is there another reason? Is it possible Hayden’s sometimes bizarre operation of his office has chased public safety workers away? We think the answer could be yes.

We also think the Johnson County Commission should consider that possibility before it writes Hayden a big check in the name of county taxpayers.

Roughly 60 sheriff’s department positions are unfilled in Johnson County. Since deputies guard the jail, and take emergency calls, any shortfall is a concern.

The jail needs guards. The county wants and needs a functioning sheriff’s department. But it isn’t clear to us how spending more money will solve the staffing problem as long as Hayden is the county sheriff.

The minimum salary in the sheriff’s department is almost $48,500 a year, growing to a maximum of $79,060 plus benefits. Overland Park pays its officers a starting wage of $47,200 a year; Olathe, $47,000 with a top of $82,000. The department’s salaries seem in line with cities’ pay structures.

But Johnson County’s department is different in a significant way: Hayden himself.

The sheriff is highly visible and controversial. He’s spoken to a so-called “constitutional sheriffs” group with ties to white supremacists. He’s spent untold thousands — in the middle of a budget crisis — to pursue an unnecessary “Big Lie” voter fraud investigation in Johnson County, a probe that appears likely to collapse.

He proposed escorting ballot boxes to election offices, angering the people actually in charge of elections. Can a department capable of dispatching officers to oversee ballot collection truly complain of a manpower shortage?

There’s more. Hayden officially invited first responders without COVID-19 vaccinations to work for his department. In June, he said 73% of his workers tested positive for coronavirus antibodies, which meant they “wouldn’t get (the disease) again.” That simply isn’t true. “Reinfections do occur after COVID-19,” the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says.

We asked for the sheriff’s comment on these issues, through the department’s media office. It did not respond. We’ve previously suggested Hayden should resign. He has not done so.

We know this: Workers have choices. Before pouring cash into the sheriff’s department, county commissioners should ask themselves if Hayden’s supervision is responsible for a 22% turnover rate, or dozens of unfilled department positions. Perhaps recruits are simply choosing to work for someone else.

Virtually every police agency in the nation reports recruiting challenges and staffing shortfalls. Policing is difficult, dangerous work. Pay is important, and if there’s evidence Johnson County deputies are severely underpaid, the county should respond.

But the work environment is important, too. Police officers and deputies can work for bosses who aren’t obsessed with weird conspiracy theories, which could be a big part of Johnson County’s problem.