In the absence of a sergeant, the officer in charge has the same authority as a sergeant to informally counsel or orally reprimand an employee. When officers arrive at the beginning of their shift, the officer in charge of the preceding shift provides any pertinent information to the sergeant or officer in charge of the shift. All the officers, including the sergeant, then generally disperse and have little contact with each other. As calls come into the department during a shift, or as officers observe problems, such information is first passed on to the sergeant or the officer in charge of the shift. The sergeant, or officer in charge of the shift, either handles the situation or asks someone else to handle the situation if another officer is in the problem area.
Sergeants have access to personnel files.
Neither Corporals nor senior officers in charge of a shift prepare quarterly reports, prepare performance evaluations, attend staff meetings, prepare the monthly work schedule, grant or deny leave, or have access to personnel files. At issue is whether sergeants are supervisors, and thus ineligible to belong to a bargaining unit pursuant to 21 V.S.A. Sections 1502 and 1722. Nor do rare or infrequent supervisory acts change the status of an employee to a supervisor. The existence of actual power, rather than the frequency of its use, determines supervisory status. However infrequently used, the power exercised must be genuine.