Sullivan County — It’s a problem without an easy fix.

The New York State Dept. of Environmental Conservation (DEC) needs more dispatchers as well as more Conservation Officers.

To try and make ends meet – and serve the public – the ECOs (Environmental Conservation Officers) are regularly tasked with performing scheduled office-duty days, including for dispatch, the NYSDEC said.

This, according to Matthew Krug, Vice President of the Police Benevolent Assn. (PBA) of New York State, presents a problem for ECOs who are trying to do more work with less manpower.

“We are currently down 74 officers,” Krug said. “The DEC is attempting to hire 30 more officers but we have been battling short-staffing issues for the past five or six years.

“It [staffing] is not getting any better,” Krug said. “Staffing numbers are supposed to be at 342, which is a  number that goes back decades.”

Krug said one recent DEC class had 56 applicants start the training class and approximately 24 graduate. The class takes between 8 to 9 months to complete.

“They’ve also tried to hire dispatchers,” Krug said.

The NYS DEC 

is busier than ever

Sullivan County, which is in DEC Region 3, currently has three Environmental Conservation Officers assigned to cover it.

They cover the towns of Rockland, Neversink, Liberty, Callicoon, Fre-mont, Delaware, Bethel, Thompson, Cochecton, Tusten, Highland, Lum-berland, and Forestburgh. And the Orange County towns of Deerpark, Greenville, Minisink, and Warwick. 

The Sullivan County towns of Mamakating and Fallsburg are coverered by two ECOs who also cover 12 Orange County towns.

Besides increasing the hours of hunting each day and expanding the length of hunting seasons, there are new laws the ECOs are supposed to enforce and expanded emphasis on checking for aquatic and invasive species, Krug said. 

According to the DEC, “The New York State Department of Environmental Con-servation’s Division of Law Enforcement fielded an estimated 45,000 calls in the first half of 2025.”

That’s 246 calls a day, seven days a week.

According to the DEC, “[Those calls] resulted in Environmental Con-servation Police Officers and Investigators across the state responding to more than 18,934 complaints and working on cases that resulted in 9,440 tickets or arrests for violations ranging from deer poaching to solid waste dumping, illegal mining, the illegal pet trade, and excessive emissions violations.”

Krug pointed out that with [deer and bear] hunting seasons now running from September into January the ECOs are busier than ever.

“We can’t be doing more  with less,” Krug said. “When you expand the officers’ duties to dispatching, it’s taking a body away from the field for longer.”

The DEC said, “The recent extension of ECOs office-duty hours does not impact the number of ECOs that are in the field responding to calls or patrolling for regulatory compliance.

“ECOs are regularly tasked with performing scheduled office-duty days, including for dispatch. This provides the public with an available person to answer the DEC hotline during daytime and evening hours, ensuring that calls and reports are prioritized and investigated as needed for the continued protection of our environment and public,” the DEC said.

Krug said, “Having officers in the field is the most important job and duty they can perform. It’s a very, very busy time [deer season] to have our officers do this [dispatch].”