KOOTENAI COUNTY, Idaho — Kootenai County Sheriff Robert Norris held a press conference on Wednesday to talk about crime, including the shooting death of a Hauser man on Monday night and other larger-scale trends.
But Norris also took time to talk about what he said were staffing issues in the sheriff's office spanning multiple areas, including the patrol division, the county's emergency communications center and county jail staff.
According to Norris, Kootenai County's population has grown by almost 40,000 people from 2009 until now.
"One of, if not the fastest growing, counties in the United States," Norris said of Kootenai County.
"Something I wish wasn't true. Don't we? Don't we wish it wasn't true? That's for sure," he continued, while looking at Kootenai County Commissioner Bill Brooks.
In that same time, Norris said the sheriff's office's patrol division has only grown by one deputy, from 13 deputies and three sergeants across three shifts in 2009 to 14 deputies and three sergeants across three shifts in 2022.
With the growth in North Idaho not projected to stop in the near future, Norris said the sheriff's office needs help to keep up with the problems caused by growth.
"This isn't the Sleepy Hollow that it once was, and we are projected to grow significantly in the next several years," Norris said. "We need a sheriff's office commensurate with those needs."
Norris said staffing shortages aren't limited solely to patrol deputies. In addition to the six patrol deputy vacancies the department is currently facing, Norris also said the Kootenai County's 911 dispatch center has nine vacancies. At the Kootenai County Jail, which Norris said is operating at its functional capacity, it's a similar story, with Norris reporting 21 positions remaining vacant on Wednesday.
The sheriff also pointed out that many people working in those departments have less than two years of experience, including 34 people working in the jail, 13 working in the patrol division and four people in the 911 center.
One of the main reasons Norris cited as causing the staff shortages was the rising housing prices and costs of living in Kootenai County.
"The average price of a home to live here now is almost $580,000," Norris said. "I'm having people quit, because they have to go back to North Carolina and live with their parents because they're getting a notice of a rent increase next month for $600."
According to Realtor.com, the median listing price for a home in Coeur d'Alene as of Tuesday was $560,600, although real estate agents have said in previous KREM stories that houses will go for over the listing price.
With those living costs rising, Norris said it's also harder to recruit people from other industries that may be less strenuous, adding that they've also lost some people to those industries.
To fix this, Norris said the sheriff's office needs more money to attract and keep people in the various departments within his office.
"I believe there's a culture within this government, that for whatever reason, there is a reluctance to want to pay employees a reasonable living wage," Norris said.
The problem, Brooks said, is not limited to just the sheriff's office.
"There are people in other departments, professionals, not a clerk. What I mean, somebody who's in the planning department, I'm thinking college-educated, qualified, and they take the job in Kootenai County. Two or three days later they come back and say, 'Can't, can't take it. I'm sorry, I can't find a place to live on the salary you're paying.'," Brooks said.
Brooks, one of three county commissioners in Kootenai County, said he has had struggles in getting county employees pay increases to cover rises in the cost of living.
"I had to fight like the dickens last time we did a budget to get a COLA (Cost-of-Living Adjustment)," Brooks said.