Council wants more information before going further
By Gene Robbins, Managing Editor
Manville will “leave the door open” to talks about joining a Somerset County regional police force, but wants to know more before committing further, Mayor Angelo Corradino said.
”We’re not saying no, but there need to be a number of changes in the proposal before we consider it,” he said Wednesday.
A Prosecutor’s Task Force study of police departments in Somerset County issued a final report dated April 12. Leaders had asked municipalities to respond by Aug. 1.
The Borough Council on Monday unanimously adopted a resolution asking for more information, specifically on the cost of full implementation of the report, how the transition would work and whether precinct boundaries would change in the future.
Members also wanted to hear the concerns and questions of members of other governing bodies.
The mayor said he wants to make sure there would be a police presence in the borough.
”Getting a car from Amwell Road to Manville would take a number of minutes, and sometimes minutes can be crucial,” he said.
A special Borough Council committee of chairwoman Sherri Lynn, Ed Komoroski and Stephen Szabo reported at the special meeting Monday.
Manville, which has a 22-member force now and a relatively new headquarters on North Main Street, could expect to save $2.4 million over 10 years if it joined a regional department, said the report of a task force chaired by Prosecutor Geoffrey Soriano.
The report said Manville could align in one of five precincts, along with Hillsborough, Montgomery, Millstone and Rocky Hill.
The report also suggested Hillsborough might be the best place to locate one of the five proposed precinct headquarters. The report also said Manville’s headquarters could be kept open and used primarily as a detective bureau.
Hillsborough on July 24 said it wouldn’t go further in considering the idea. Montgomery Township said ‘no’, too, July 18.
In total, the report projected the 21 county municipalities could save nearly $44 million over 10 years.
Assemblyman Jack Ciattarelli, a Hillsborough resident, said at the release of the report in April that figure would be a low estimate, with $70 million as a middle ground and $100 million as optimistic.
”My concerns remain the same as they were when the report first came out,” Mayor Corradino said. “I do not like the idea of no police presence in our town. The other concern is we are in the wrong district. We should be in the central district with Somerville, Bound Brook, Raritan and the other towns with the same demographics as ours.
”I have always been a proponent of police consolidation but not at the expense of the welfare or safety of our community,” he said.

