GRAFTON, Wis.— With gas prices remaining high, many are affected, including first responders.
We are all feeling the pain at the pump, especially police departments whose officers use their cars 24/7.
Officer Ryan Volkert spends most of his shift inside his car patrolling the Grafton community. He, like many other officers, spends his entire shift driving around town.
“I would say 90% of our time is spent in the cars,” Volkert said.
With officers in cars all the time, departments consistently use a lot of gas each day.
“We always fill up gas at the end of our shift so I would say every 12 hours we fill them up,” Volkert said.
On average, officers at the Grafton police department go through 1,100 gallons of gas each month. And although they are tax exempt, Grafton Police Department Chief Jeff Caponera said these rising gas prices are making a big impact on their budget.
“We had about a 74% increase in gas prices or impact to our budget. That’s a big number and thats a lot of dollars that we could be spending on other things,” Caponera said.
With a daily trip to the pump for their officers, it’s a tricky price increase to avoid for the department.
“With these big trucks it's a little scary. They take a lot of gas,” Volkert said.
Volkert said while he is filling up his tank, he stands there watching the price climb with each gallon. However, there isn’t much the department can do about gas prices and they must continue to serve their community no matter how much it may cost.
“We have to maintain our fleet on a full tank of gas each time because they have to be ready for deployment in any situation,” Caponera said.
Like many others, the department said it is hoping for some relief when it comes to gas prices to maintain their budget down the line.
While the department said they don’t have plans to change operations just yet, the rise in prices could cause a domino effect the longer they stay at the rate they currently are.