Village police put on leave
By DAVID FITZGERALD - dfitzgerald@nwherald.com
PORT BARRINGTON – The village of Port Barrington put its entire police force on administrative leave Wednesday night after police Chief Ronald Chan requested that the board provide health insurance to his full-time commander and work out some overtime payment issues.
The McHenry County and Lake County sheriffs’ departments are handling all police matters in the village until further notice.
The part-time police department had two full-time officers and three part-time officers, according to its Web site.
Chan, who has been with the force since 1982, said he had no idea that his speaking out in support for Cmdr. Lawrence Benner to get health insurance and overtime pay issues resolved would result in the suspension of the entire police department.
“We didn’t expect this at all,” Chan said. “They threw us out on administrative leave.”
Benner, who will have been with the police department 15 years Thursday, said the Village Board went into closed session Wednesday night to discuss the request and then placed the police department on leave.
At the June 3 Port Barrington Committee of the Whole meeting, Chan first approached the trustees about providing health insurance for Benner. Minutes from that meeting show the trustees disagreed about whether to provide Benner with insurance. During that meeting, Village President Mike Head said the total cost of the insurance would be $7,200 a year, based on the amount paid to other village employees.
Head did not return calls or e-mails asking for comment. Staff at Village Hall would not comment, and other trustees did not return phone calls.
Chan said the Village Board is supposed to address the matter at a meeting early next week.
McHenry County Sheriff Keith Nygren said his department would answer any calls for police service 24 hours a day in Port Barrington. His department already provided police coverage to the village whenever it didn’t have any officers on duty.
“If there is nobody on duty there, we’ll go out there,” Nygren said. “That’s how it’s always been.”
Nygren said handling calls full time would take away some of his resources.
“Any time you have a police department that is on duty some of the time and suddenly is not, that does create a burden,” he said. “But [Port Barrington] is not a hotbed of illegal activity.”
Known as Fox River Valley Gardens until it changed its name in 2003, Port Barrington had an estimated population of 1,965 in 2008, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.
