HIGHTSTOWN: Borough actions on new cop funding unclear

But all seem to agree no commitment was made

By Vic Monaco, Managing Editor
   HIGHTSTOWN – Did the Borough Council recently give Police Chief James Eufemia formal permission to seek a federal grant, with local financial strings attached, to hire more officers?
   Has the chief filed the application?
   Those questions apparently remained unanswered, at least to some borough leaders, this week.
   But one thing seems certain: The council has not yet committed to any new police hiring.
   On March 23, council members appeared to reach a consensus to allow the chief to apply for funding for two new officers through the federal office of Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS) Hiring Recovery Program. After which, the chief said he would begin working on the application immediately.
   The context:
   • the council had rejected the chief’s request for two officers in the 2009 budget;
   • that budget includes $2.16 million in police-related expenditures;
   • the borough still awaits a consultant’s study on the feasibility of East Windsor taking over police coverage in Hightstown;
   • the Borough Council has agreed to talk to East Windsor about total consolidation.
   Asked last week about the juxtaposition of the go-ahead given the chief with the aforementioned context, Council President Walter Sikorski acknowledged the timing might sound strange. But he stressed that “there was no council resolution” and said he planned to seek “clarification” from Borough Administrator Candace Gallagher on whether one is needed before the chief could file the application.
   Councilwoman Isabel McGinty said this week she thinks the council only gave the chief authority to look further into the grant program, not to file the application. She, too, tacitly acknowledged that the timing might appear odd.
   So why didn’t someone say ‘hold the phone?’
   ”There was no need for that reaction because it was so preliminary,” she answered while adding that she had been given no other information on the COPS program.
   ”I like to know something about what’s being talked about before I shoot it down,” she said.
   One council member who might be expected to be the first to shoot down such a plan – given his staunch support for total consolidation with East Windsor – is Mike Theokas. But he said he supported the application because the “free officers” could “help offset some of the overtime that our current, sometimes shorthanded, police force incurs.”
   That overtime cost the borough $134,098 in 2008.
   But Mr. Theokas, like Ms, McGinty, stressed that the borough is not obligated to accept the grant.
   However, unlike Mr. Sikorski and Ms. McGinty, Mr. Theokas said he believes the council did give the chief permission to seek the grant.
   So, what actually happened at the March 23 meeting?
   ”The thought was that if it doesn’t require council action and there’s no commitment, do it (file the grant application),” replied Ms. Gallagher on Thursday, “because it really doesn’t mean anything.”
   Ms. Gallagher also said she wasn’t sure if the chief had filed the application and if that submission might ultimately require a formal resolution by the council.
   ”We may have to,’ she said.
   For his part, Chief Eufemia did not respond to the Herald.
   The COPS program pays the full cost of new officers for a period of three years while requiring communities to keep those officers on board for at least one more year and pay for any years beyond the third.
   ”We’re just looking out for funding options,” said Ms. McGinty said this week, “and the chief said his understanding … is that the council did not have to commit and accept the funding until we knew more about it”
   ”I did not commit that the borough would take on one or two more officers that the borough would have to pay for three or four years down the line. … The mayor also said there was no commitment on the part of the borough.”
   Ms. McGinty added that it’s “not impossible we won’t have increased (police) demand” if the borough successfully moves ahead with the stalled development of the former rug mill on Bank Street and the former Minute Maid plant site.
   Mr. Theokas said, “My general opinion is, not surprisingly, that while no harm is done by applying for the grant, in light of the pending police consolidation study and the proposition of total consolidation, that even if the grant was awarded, that Hightstown not make the new hires.”
   A spokesman for the COPS program said the ongoing police study would not be considered when reviewing the potential application. But he add that, given the retention requirements of the grant, it is possible the borough would have to pay back the grant money if the borough police force were dissolved.
   Staff writer Sean Ruppert contributed to this story.