Kendall County crime-suppression detail credited with quieter summer; officials cite hundreds of stops and arrests

Under Sheriff Bobby Richardson and Oswego Police Chief Baston told the Oswego Village Board on July 15 that a county-led crime-suppression detail involving the Kendall County Sheriff’s Office, municipal police departments and Illinois State Police produced hundreds of traffic contacts, citations and arrests and appears to have reduced violent incidents this summer.

The task force, assembled after a roundtable that included Kendall County Board Chair Matt Kellogg and local mayors, combined undercover and overt teams from the county and participating municipalities. “This was something that county board chair, Matt Kellogg, and I kind of put together just thinking outside the box,” Richardson said during the board meeting.

Richardson presented what he described as a snapshot of activity tied to the detail: 816 traffic stops; roughly 540 citations written; 181 arrestable offenses; 187 searched vehicles; five DUI arrests; recoveries of stolen vehicles; 619 grams of cannabis; 3.2 grams of cocaine; “some crack cocaine; and a few guns,” he said. Richardson emphasized the figures are tied to the task force’s operations, not to all county policing during the same period.

Chief Baston credited Richardson and the county for the initiative. “This was really, under sheriff Richardson’s brainchild,” Baston said, and noted the operation allowed municipalities to leverage additional manpower without diverting regular patrol officers from calls for service.

Officials described the detail as a “force multiplier.” Richardson said days when the state police contributed large numbers of officers produced visible results: “There’s known gang members that have said, you know, they recognize what’s going on. They see the nights where the state police brought in additional bodies and we had greater than 20 officers all out there targeting gang crime,” he said.

The detail required temporary deputization of municipal officers so they could operate countywide. Richardson and Baston said the operation relied heavily on overtime funding and was funded this year without a prior budget allocation. “This does cost money. And this was unbudgeted overtime, that we went in on this year,” Richardson said; he and Baston said organizers will sit down with stakeholders to evaluate the program’s costs and results and determine whether to repeat it in future summers.

Board members praised the collaboration and asked how continuation would be funded. One trustee, speaking during the meeting, urged the board to revisit the program in the fall budget cycle: “I fully support you guys moving forward with that. So, I would like to discuss that again at our budget meeting in October, or prior to that if you need additional funding,” the trustee said.

Officials cautioned the detail’s success is not fully measurable in prevented crimes, but they pointed to the volume of contacts and arrests and to anecdotal reports from known offenders as evidence the presence of the task force had a deterrent effect. Richardson also noted operational security reasons for not publishing a fixed schedule and that the timeframe for the detail remains flexible.

Officials said other benefits included faster mass-response to major incidents because additional officers were already in the area. The board did not take a formal vote on the program at the July 15 meeting; staff and county officials said they will report back with cost and structure recommendations for possible inclusion in future budgets.

Ending: The village board hearing the update signaled broad support for the multiagency approach but left funding and long-term structure for later budget deliberations.