Two years ago State Police Troop L’s workforce was so short-staffed it couldn’t afford to patrol fatality-prone state roads in Tangipahoa and Washington parishes.

Today, the boys in blue are fixtures on those area’s country back roads and rolling farmlands with an influx of new hires.

Mandeville-based Troop L’s workforce has surged 100 percent since 2006 from 31 troopers to 61, Troop L spokesman Trooper Louis Calato said. Meanwhile, 13 more perspective troopers are in training and, if they graduate, could boost the troop size to 74 by March of next year, Calato said.

It’s the first significant increase in manpower since 1974, he said.

“We didn’t have the manpower to police those (rural) areas, write tickets or be visible, even though that’s where a lot of fatal crashes are” Calato said. “Now we do, and (residents) are glad to see troopers there. They’re glad to see us writing tickets.”

The new troopers are part of a five-year plan to hire 250 more patrolmen statewide for a 28 percent increase, from 1,100 troopers to 1,350. About 100 or so have already been hired.

“Before Katrina we were reactive. We’d respond to crashes, calls and depended on the Sheriff’s Office to work a lot of our scenes,” Calato said. “Now it’s different.”

Specifically, the influx has allowed three motorcycle troopers in St. Tammany to target seat belt violators only, and it appears to be working: 90 to 95 percent of St. Tammany drivers wear seatbelts, Calato said, versus 83 percent nationwide, according to State Police surveys and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.

Also, the troop has developed a plan, although not implemented, to place troopers on school buses to catch traffic violators in and around bus routes. A trooper who witnesses an infraction would call ahead to another trooper to make the stop.

While ranking officers often praised those out of the box initiatives, they rarely came to fruition. Over the years, State Police were charged with additional responsibilities such as gaming and narcotic patrols but never saw a manpower hike. As is, the troopers were already stretched thin.

Only four or five troopers were on patrol at any given shift in the four-parish area that includes St.Tammany, St. Helena, Washington and Tangipahoa parishes. And with a growing St. Tammany Parish population, many troopers couldn’t leave the parish.

Wreck after wreck, call after call, would force them to stay in St. Tammany, Calato said.

Often, Sheriff’s Office deputies picked up the slack, although State Police’s patrol areas are typically out of the Sheriff’s Office’s jurisdiction.

Sheriff Jack Strain called the new troopers life saving buffers on state roadways that “have become deathtraps.”

In 2007, Strain was a leading proponent of a House bill that would have funded 400 additional troopers to have a ratio of one trooper to every 3,000 people. That measure, authored in part by state Rep. Tim Burns, R-Mandeville, and then state Rep. Pete Schneider, R-Slidell, failed 84-11, said Butch Spears, a spokesperson for the state House of Representatives.

The effort, however, didn’t die. A manpower study proved State Police were “behind the curve,” and eventually money was allocated by Gov. Bobby Jindal to fund new hires, Calato said.

In August, 20 of those hires graduated from the Louisiana State Police Training Academy in Baton Rouge. Four men — Damien J. McAlister, August C. McKay III, Russell E. Sibley Jr. and Paul S. Strickland — joined Troop L in Mandeville.