AUBURN – If the Androscoggin County sheriff can spare six deputies, a jail guard and a part-timer for four days to pay respect to a comrade who died, then how can Sheriff Guy Desjardins complain that he has too few officers?

The question – raised in correspondence to local officials by the chairman of the county commission – has drawn blistering criticism from leaders inside the department.

“Unbelievable,” Sheriff Guy Desjardins said Tuesday. “How low can somebody go?”

The local officers went to Washington last week to attend services at the National Law Enforcement Officers’ Memorial, where Sgt. David Rancourt, a longtime deputy who died on duty last fall, was remembered.

“If the sheriff is understaffed as he claims, how could he possibly allow it?” Berry wrote.

Berry and Desjardins have been battling for months over whether to add an officer to the county ranks. The sheriff says he needs the officer to aid patrols at night, particularly after midnight when two deputies are the only police on duty in eight county towns.

The Budget Committee approved the position, but the commission has blocked efforts to fill it.

Berry argues that the county might not be able to afford the deputy. Of particular worry is $180,000 community corrections funds, earmarked by the Budget Committee to offset spending increases.

Berry worries that the $180,000 might never reach county coffers.

He aimed to tell his side of the story in correspondence to the towns: 16 pages in all with two devoted to the deputies and their trip.

“Explain the whole thing to the towns,” Berry said Tuesday. “The sheriff’s screaming that he’s short on help.”

Desjardins said Tuesday he still is short-handed. The trip only proved the officers’ cooperation, he said.

Each officer paid his own way, said the sheriff. Each used vacation time to go, time that was approved only when a replacement was found.

At first, the department planned to send only two or three officers to Washington. More wanted to go.

As early as January, Desjardins challenged deputies to come up with a schedule that would allow other officers to attend. They did.

To lend a hand, Desjardins, Patrol Capt. Raymond Lafrance and a lieutenant, all salaried workers, took on the vacant shifts.

A few days later, when Rancourt was remembered with a service in Augusta, troopers from the Maine State Police lent a hand by adding patrols so more deputies could attend.

Sgt. Rielly Bryant, chief steward of the county’s labor union, said he was appalled by Berry’s question.

“The union and friends of David Rancourt cannot believe that Commissioner Berry would pull the name of a fallen officer into his political battle to try to gain positive press for the commissioners,” he said.

Berry’s questions – and his package of information – went to boards of selectman in seven Androscoggin County towns: Leeds, Greene, Wales, Durham, Livermore, Turner and Minot.

“I got letters from the towns that weren’t true,” Berry said Tuesday. “I sent them documentation with the letter.”

His cover letter to the towns blames Desjardins for “mismanagement of resources in an attempt to build a bigger department.”

The package also included the full text of a bill, now languishing in the Maine Legislature, that would reduce county taxes for towns that have their own police.

That, too, adds pressure on the county to keep spending low, Berry said.

Ron Grant, chairman of the Greene selectmen, said he received the packet on Monday, but he read little of it.

“I am too disgusted,” Grant said.

He believes the commission ought to have listened to the Budget Committee, which included a banker from his town, and hired the additional officer.

And the issue of the officers attending the memorial?

“If this is the where the commissioners have gone, they’re a sorry lot of people,” he said. “That, to me, is just outright, blatantly lousy.”