Independence Day festivities increasing local law enforcements’ workload

With Independence Day fast approaching, many have already gotten into the holiday mindset, resulting in a surge of calls at many local law enforcement agencies.

On Tuesday, the Pocatello Police Department took 110 calls for service in a 24-hour period.

“That’s a lot of calls for service, that’s a lot of reports for them to write,” Diane Brush, the department’s community services specialist explained.

“I tried to get an officer to do this interview for you and they were just all too busy,” Brush said, explaining that many were first taking lunch at 3 p.m. “So, it’s been a busy day.”

Brush said that many of the calls the department received yesterday were for fireworks or other loud noises.

She urged people to be more tolerant during the holiday week.

“Unless, you know, there’s a danger or, of course, if it’s very very late at night,” She said.

Despite the busy days many of the officers expect to have, the department always makes sure it’s are adequately staffed, prioritizing all the calls.

“Anything involving people, like batteries, assaults, anything like that, those get higher priority than say a VIN inspection or maybe a report of a parking problem,” Brush explained.

Prioritizing based on severity is something ISP troopers also must do during this hectic week that’s one of the busiest of the year.

“I have noticed a dramatic increase in the level of contacts we have during this week,” Lt. Mike Winans said. “For whatever reason, the hot weather and the holiday combined create some issues for us.”

Winans said higher priority calls are always going to get a higher priority response.

“If we have injury crashes or crashes with road blockage, then you’re going to see troopers responding to those situations, their attention to those are going to be higher than say a piece of tire tread in the road,” Winans said.

Both offices said that lower priority calls should be expected to have slower than normal response times, but that help will be on its way.

In some cases, it might even be easier to fill out a report online.

But one of the biggest things you can do to help yourself and local law enforcement is just using common sense.

“If you anticipate drinking then don’t get behind the wheel. Find somebody that’s sober, use a designated driver,” Winans said, “but use your head.”