FAIRFAX, Va. – Fairfax County Sheriff Deputy 1^st Lt. Maegan Diotalevi received Fairfax County’s highest employee award, the A. Heath Onthank Award for Merit at Government Center, during the county’s board meeting June 24. Diotalevi was one of three recipients for this year’s award. The other two awardees were Jennifer Dickinson with the Library, and Kara Pyne with Fairfax County Public Schools. All three were honored for their accomplishments in improving public service.

“Lt. Diotalevi embodies our core values of Honor, Courage, and Service, and I’m extremely proud of all she has accomplished to receive this recognition,” said Lt. Col. Casey Lingan. “Our agency currently faces more than a 25 percent staffing shortage. In order to maintain operations and provide the exceptional service our community expects, our deputies have had to reimagine procedures and at times alter operations. Lt. Diotalevi did just that in our Booking Unit and for our recruiting efforts.”

As a deputy sheriff, Diotalevi feels the pain of the staffing shortage. While working in the Booking Unit, she identified a way to free up officer time and streamline how people who are arrested are processed into the Adult Detention Center (ADC) by creating the program “Intaker.”

“I saw an opportunity to implement a plan that would take some of the stress off the deputies who were processing inmates into the ADC,” Diotalevi said. “The previous booking system was outdated and was done manually – literally a pen and paper log – resulting in an extremely long wait time for people to be booked as well as the officers who are required to wait. There had to be a solution to do this to ultimately free up officer time and get people where they needed to be quicker.”

Once she identified how to modernize the outdated, manual booking system, Diotalevi took it upon herself to create training videos for deputies and all local law enforcement agencies that come to the facility, which allowed staff to quickly learn and implement the new system.

“Since we implemented the new program, we are now able to electronically track the time each officer and deputy arrives in the Sallyport with a prisoner or someone who needs access to the Office of Magistrate,” Casey said. “This has worked extremely well and since it is all tracked electronically, the information is shared throughout the sheriff’s office by those who need it.”

Diotalevi recently took on a new role within the Human Resources and Recruiting Division where she continues to find ways to overcome the staffing shortage. Her job in this role is to help bring new recruits and employees into the agency. As the main webmaster for the FCSO recruiting website, she was instrumental in incorporating the AI chatbot. This allows the recruiting team to capture the interested person’s name and phone number. A recruiter then follows up with the person to engage in a conversation. Before this technology, people would visit the website and leave without gaining any information about the agency.

“AI is part of our everyday lives, and I really wanted figure out a way to apply it to our recruiting efforts,” Diotalevi explained. “The chatbot helps in two ways – it can give potential recruits real-time answers, and it gives us an insight into the questions people have about working here, being a deputy, or how long training is.”

The sheriff’s office embraces innovation throughout the agency, and Lt. Diotalevi is an example of thinking out of the box to for a solution. With more than 23 years of service with the agency, she continues to offer brilliant ideas, provides guidance to everyone she encounters, and a smile at every turn. She’s already planting the seeds for a more robust recruiting website, so stay tuned to the next great idea she’s executing within her agency to continue to provide outstanding service to our community.

The Fairfax Board of Supervisors established the A. Heath Onthank Award in 1966 in memory of retired Army Col. A. Heath Onthank, who was also the first Chairman of Fairfax County Civil Service Commission from 1957-1962. The award represents the best of the county and school system. Since its implementation, 357 employees of Fairfax County have received the A. Heath Onthank Award. Congratulations again to Lt. Diotalevi and her fellow recipients.