The uniforms will change, but many of the faces will stay the same when the Niles Park District takes over security duties on Tuesday.
The parks patrol was created after the Police Department informed Park District officials that a recent rules change would increase the cost of using auxiliary police officers from $13.50 to $55 per hour, said Joe LoVerde, executive director of the Park District. He said auxiliary officers have patrolled the parks for at least a decade.
“We are excited to get this going,” said LoVerde, who was elected to the Village Board in April.
The Niles parks security officers will be paid $13.50 per hour, and three people will patrol the district’s 24 sites nightly during the summer, LoVerde said.
Bob Krieling, 54, who has been on Niles park patrol for seven years, will be the administrator of the security force.
“We are on the lookout for safety, especially in the summer when there are lots of kids playing in the parks,” he said. “It makes parents feel better to know we are out there.”
Many of the 20 employees have patrolled the parks as auxiliary officers, officials said. The officers can write citations but cannot make arrests.
Enforcing park rules and closing hours and checking facilities will be the focus. Officials said the security patrol also will also handle crowd control, working on the same radio frequency as Niles police.
The security budget will stay at $60,000 per year, with the parks continuing to lease two patrol cars from the village for $400 per month, LoVerde said. The start-up costs for the unit will be about $6,000 for flashlights, shirts and uniforms, he said.
Police Chief Dean Strzelecki said his department has about 55 part-time auxiliary officers who handle non-emergency duties, but a state law and a recent collective bargaining agreement prohibited the department from putting auxiliary officers on park patrol. Instead, police officers would have to be compensated at the overtime rate, or about $55 per hour, he said.
