Macomb County Sheriff Anthony Wickersham recently announced he is proposing a county-wide “crime suppression unit” to target specific types and locations where wrongdoing is occurring.
Wickersham gained approval from County Executive Mark Hackel to add one sergeant and two deputies to get the unit started as part of the Sheriff’s Office 2025 proposed budget.
The proposal went to the county Board of Commissioners late last month. Commissioners can approve the additional personnel when they vote Nov. 21 on the county budget.
“This team will go throughout all of Macomb County and deal with crime issues in Macomb County, whether it’s home invasions in a certain community or B & E’s occurring to certain businesses, or going out after drug traffickers or homicide suspects,” Wickersham told the board late last month at a committee budget hearing. “It’s well-needed in a county of our size. With all of us working together we can make Macomb County a safer place.”
Wickersham said the unit would be initially composed of four officers but hopes it will grow and include officers from many departments in the county. The city of Roseville has already committed an officer to immediately join the unit when it gets up and running next year, he added.
“It’s a start,” he said at the meeting of the initial squad.
The sheriff said in an interview the squad would go beyond what an individual police department typically can do to prevent crime especially when they are reports of a surge of a certain type of crime in a certain area, and when incidents cross community borders.
“We can do a lot more collaborating more as a collective group working together rather than a single group,” Wickersham said. “The goal would be, boy, if we could, to get the participation of all of the police agencies. We’re going to be able to have two teams running throughout Macomb County working on specific areas of crime.”
Commissioner Harold Haugh of Roseville said at the meeting he talked about it to Roseville Police Chief Mitch Berlin. “He thinks it’s innovative and creative and will help out in all of the municipalities,” Haugh said.
In addition to Roseville, a handful of other departments expressed interest in participating but could not immediately supply an officer.
The number of serious crimes in the county increased substantially the past two years over the prior two years, 2020-21, based on felony cases filed in Macomb Circuit Court, according to state court statistics.
However, the drop in crime in 2020 and 2021 has been attributed to the COVID-19 pandemic, and the number of filings have gradually been dropping over the past 18 years, based on felony-case court filings.
The number of felony filings last year, 3,750, is more comparable to the 3,941 cases filed in 2019.
Those totals, however, fall short of the number of cases throughout the 2000-teens when between 4,000 and 5,000 felony cases were filed each year.
And before that, from 2006 through 2010, the number of felony cases filed at circuit court annually exceeded 5,000.
The addition of three officers would increase the number of sheriff’s employee positions to 505.5.
A sergeant’s pay range is about $98,000 to $107,500 while a deputy’s pay range is about $66,000 to $84,000.
Existing internal units operated in the Sherff’s Office include the Dive Team, the Motor (motorcycle) Unit, SWAT, the Mobile Field Force, K-9, the Crisis Negotiations Team, fire investigations, the Corrections Emergency Response Team, the Crisis Incident Stress Management and the Unmanned Aerial Vehicle.
Multi-jurisdictional squads include the County of Macomb Enforcement Team (the drug unit), which is operated by the Michigan State Police; Macomb Auto Theft Squad; Sheriff’s Enforcement Team, which is a team of detectives who conduct narcotic investigations, execute search warrants, apprehend fugitives, assist with major criminal investigations and work with other local, federal and state agencies; and the Macomb Area Computer Enforcement Team.
Wickersham’s request for to add a third mechanic to the current staff of two was rejected by Hackel but could be restored by the board and possibly be subject to a veto. That would increase the total staff to 506.5 positions.
Wickersham said the size of his department’s vehicle fleet continues to rise, and another mechanic is needed to provide routine maintenance such as oil changes and replacing brake pads.
The proposed sheriff’s budget for 2025 is $109 million, an increase of $9 million from last year.
More than half of that is due to a more than $5 million increase in personnel costs, much of it attributed to wage increases and maintaining staff. A large chunk is also due to the rising cost of operating the jail.