CRAIG BEACH — This small community of about 1,000 residents is dealing with a diminished police force after four officers turned in their resignations at last week’s village council meeting.

“We knew it was coming,” said Mayor James Becker. “Local television and Channel 19 News in Cleveland were called and asked to be at the meeting.”

During the meeting, Becker said Chief Kyle Pettus, Cmdr. Crystal Casterline, Sgt. Renatta Griffith and Lt. Richard Johnson submitted their resignations. Council accepted all of them.

He said Sgt. Michael Hudson and patrolman Ernest Hudson decided to stay and are the village’s only officers. Becker said a third officer was on active military leave and was not involved.

One issue for both the officers and council involves the village’s police cars. The force has three police cars, but because they sit around a lot, the batteries tend to go down, making them unreliable.

“The department wanted to purchase two used cars with 180,000 miles on them. Not a good idea,” Becker said. “Before all this happened, we were considering purchasing a new vehicle.”

He said that is up in the air because of the resignations.

Becker said the Craig Beach Police Department is made up of all part-time officers. He said they may work as little as three hours per week sometimes, and on average the daily hours total around five.

“Since we are a part-time department, about 60% of our calls have been handled by the Mahoning County sheriff,” Becker said. “We are talking with the sheriff and may be working with him for coverage. It might be a good thing for us.”

Sheriff Jerry Greene said, “We would be willing to talk. It’s a wait and see. In the meantime, we will cover Craig Beach. I won’t let any community go without police protection.”

Greene also said his agency has been asked to look into possible information erased from the police department’s computers. Those computers have been confiscated and will be checked to see what, if any, information has been erased.