Reserve call-ups deplete police, fire departments

These are a different breed of soldier.

They are drawn from small-town police departments and big-city hospitals, from emergency medical crews and deputies guarding county jails, from the rank and file and the top brass of agencies charged with keeping this country safe.

As the Pentagon begins mobilizing America's 1.2 million reservists and National Guard troops - nearly 95,000 already are active - many are leaving behind not just families and loved ones, but also key public-service jobs that can't easily be filled.

Take Bernard Melekian. He's chief of the 250-member Pasadena, Calif., police force. But at 7:30 a.m. Monday, he'll sling a duffel bag over his shoulder and report for duty with the Coast Guard - a reservist called up in his 18th year of service. "It's not how I was planning to spend 2003, but I've always known it was a possibility," he says.

Listen to Joey Runyon, chief of police in Hannibal, Mo. Four of his 36 officers are gone for a month of reserve training with the 2175th military police battalion. They were activated for 10 months last year, guarding a station in Iowa, and he's sure they'll be called again soon. Chief Runyon sees some irony in the two sets of press calls he's gotten lately. One is about men called to serve, possibly in war.

The other asks what his depleted department is doing to bolster security. "They're taking them just when we're supposed to be beefing up homeland security," he says.

The exodus of reservists at this point is more a trickle than a flood. But for police departments in modest-sized towns like Mark Twain's birthplace, the loss of even a few officers can impact enforcement, especially when they're highly trained supervisors.

The jobs, by law, must be kept until reservists return, and finding a temporary replacement is difficult. With the loss of reservists piled atop tight budgets and unfilled positions, Mr. Runyon has found his task a scheduling nightmare.

"We were getting beat to death here last summer, working 50-hour weeks," he says. "It drained the overtime budget."

Across the country, states, counties, and small towns are facing a similar dilemma: How to keep America safe at home when the men and women who do that job are being called to support a possible war effort overseas:

• In tiny Papillon, Neb., six officers on a 31-man force are reservists, including two of four shift supervisors and Chief Leonard Houloose. Only one has been called up so far, but Mr. Houloose expects the rest may go, too.

• In West Virginia, the state could lose 10 percent of its 560 troopers if all are activated - and the force is already understaffed by more than 100 people. In rural counties, notes Senior Trooper Jay Powers, state police are often the only law-enforcement around. "We'll just have to make sure we take priority on calls," he says. "Before, we might have one person go to a bad traffic crash, while another person is working a murder. Now if we have both situations, the murder might have to come first."

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