South Bend Police are trying to stop the downward trend of declining officers on the force.

The latest tally of officers on the force is 231. That’s down from 250 the same time in 2016 and from 255 the year before that.

That’s not good enough for South Bend Police Chief Scott Ruszkowski, who tells ABC 57 that he’d like to see a force of around 245 officers ideally.

“When someone decides to retires a week from now, that’s still a minimum of a year to get someone to replace that person,” Chief Ruszkowski told ABC 57.

In his budget filing with the common council, Chief Ruszkowski noted that there’s about a dozen retirements coming between now and 2018 to dwindle the force even further.

In addition, Chief Ruszkowksi’s also asking for more cameras in the streets, viaducts, and parks. He says camera monitors in streets, viaducts, and parks may help in the interim.

“I think it would be beneficial to at least have the opportunity to monitor so we can see what’s going on and if there are bad things happening we can see who’s doing those,” said Chief Ruszkowski.