Officers find
a new way to
serve Howell
BY KATHY BARATTA
Staff Writer
HOWELL — Those wishing to say thank you to Howell’s finest may want to eat at Scooter’s Restaurant next week.
Starting at 5 p.m. Oct. 15, Howell’s men and women in blue will serve the public in a whole new way.
Howell police officers will be working in the kitchen preparing food that will be served by other officers who will be working as servers, waiting tables or greeting diners at the door as hosts and hostesses.
All will be on hand to raise money for the third annual Invest in s Cop fund-raiser. Scooter’s is on Route 9 south near the Lakewood border. Restaurant management volunteered to support Howell PBA Local 228.
Donations from patrons will defray the costs of eventually outfitting all police patrol cars with ballistic vests.
According to Patrolman John Weg, one of the PBA organizers of the event, the ballistic vests afford officers a lot more protection than the "soft body armor" bullet-proof vests they regularly wear.
"If we know we’re going to be involved in a shooting situation, every patrol car will have that type of vest," Weg said.
Last year’s event at Scooters raised almost $2,000 for the fund. A golf outing organized by Kirk’s Florist, Howell, and held this past summer at the Cruz Golf Course, Birdsall Road, raised an additional $7,000 for the police vest fund.
According to Weg, all officers are given their first bulletproof vest as part of their equipment when they are hired. He explained, however, that after five years of continued wear, the soft body armor of bulletproof vests deteriorates and must be replaced.
Weg said the individual officers are then responsible for purchasing their replacement vest out of their department-issued uniform allowance. Those amounts vary according to the grade level of the officer’s employment.
Weg said the cost of the vests range between $500 to $800.
In 1999, Howell officer Mark Troutman’s life was saved by the body armor he was wearing when he was shot by a home invader. Troutman and fellow officers had responded to a township home in which a hostage situation had developed. After shooting Troutman, the gunman then killed himself.