Towns, villages challenge patrol charges

[tomac]

Ergo clarence was a town before erie was a county. Thanks for proving my point

Yeahbut, Clarence was in Niagara County at that time. There have been counties here before Erie County, but no towns that weren't in some county or another.
And each of those counties had law enforcement of some kind or another.
And when new counties were formed, law enforcement was set up from the get-go. That was a given.

All I'm trying to say is that when the first towns started their own police departments, the laws should have been addressed and changed then. For the county executiove to come through and arbitrarily drop those patrols now, despite the fact that the taxpayers are paying for them and have been, is just plain wrong.

And there are some morons out there screaming that somebody is getting something for nothing - wake up! Its all paid for out of your current county taxes. If Giambra removes a service without a corresponding drop in taxes, that's theft of services and he's guilty!
He needs that extra money (as someone else said, it's all about the money) because he's pissed away all our reserves and he's got to keep on feeding his cronies!

[steven]

Yeah but, Clarence was in Niagara County at that time.

.....and erie county didnt exist. I didnt have any buts in my statement. I just said there are some towns older than Erie county. Buy your own admission I am right.

Wether its "theft of service" or not is for the courts to decide. However as I have said repeatedly and no one has refuted this yet. Most counties in the united states either patrol in all towns and villages or none. (Do you dispute that?) Why are we different?

[colossus27]

Because the towns obviously don't want to admit that maybe being asked to pay for something that makes them a very good buck in return is not that far out of line, and the PDs don't want to admit that this speeding nickel-and-diming of the driving public IS in fact largely about revenue generation, not about safety. Those messages don't serve either party, so there is somewhat of a gentlemen's agreement about not airing this aspect in public.

As always, follow the money.

And on that note, we all know that Geico- at least that one I know for certain- donates radar detectors to police departments, right? It's all about making the roads safer and not using speeding as an excuse to raise premiums.

[tomac]

.....and erie county didnt exist. I didnt have any buts in my statement. I just said there are some towns older than Erie county. Buy your own admission I am right.

Okay, i agree to that. Do you agree that while Clarence wasn't part of Erie County, it was part of another county with a sheriff's patrol of some sort?

Wether its "theft of service" or not is for the courts to decide. However as I have said repeatedly and no one has refuted this yet. Most counties in the united states either patrol in all towns and villages or none. (Do you dispute that?) Why are we different?

Most, not all. Monroe County has a police force in Rochester and a Monroe County Sheriff. So does Niagara County. I think but could be wrong that these sheriffs can patrol throughout the county.

Anyway, the point of my arguement is that the courts have to decide if Giambra is a lying sack of crap; we cannot take him at face value and say "he's right and the suburban towns are gettign something for nothing."
If, when the City of Buffalo and the town of Amherst decided to start up their own police forces, they should have said they wouldn't pay into the sheriffs at that time. Doing it now and arbitrarily by this bozo is improper at best and illegal (theft of services) at worst.

[steven]

Okay, i agree to that. Do you agree that while Clarence wasn't part of Erie County, it was part of another county with a sheriff's patrol of some sort?.

Sure, but again what happens here (NY state) and what happens in the rest of the country are two different things. When people look for "what works" its pretty rare they look at NY state as the model.

[Fordson]

And on that note, we all know that Geico- at least that one I know for certain- donates radar detectors to police departments, right? It's all about making the roads safer and not using speeding as an excuse to raise premiums.

This is true - but it happened many years ago. GEICO got a real black eye for this - I am sure they are not eager to have this brought to anyone's attention again.

I guess my point in my post was that the towns are trying to say that they need the enforcement, and they don't want to be charged for that - because the county and state PDs are supposedly obligated to do that. The thing they don't want anyone to know is that the county and state police do much more for them than provide enforcement - they provide big bucks. And they are in no way obligated to provide that.

But no one in any of the town or other municipal governments is willing to acknowledge this.

And yes, the emphasis on using traffic enforcement to generate revenue is wrong.

[steven]

Jul 11, 2006 - That's according to the County Attorney. The Erie County Attorney has determined that the county has no legal obligation to provide the sheriff's road patrol to any community within it's boundries. County attorney, Laurence Rubin says he looked back at similar cases from the 1970's and 80's, in other New York counties and found the courts and the attorney generals office both concurred that no county has to offer regular road patrol services, unless municipalities offer to pay for the cost of that service.

Rubin sent this new information Tuesday Night to both Sheriff Tim Howard and Budget Director, Jim Hartman. He says that it makes no difference weather a community has it's own local police force or not, the county has sole discretion as to weather it wants to or can afford to offer the road patrol. Erie County has already notified communities that if they want the sheriff in town. They're going to have to start paying for it.

http://www.wkbw.com/Story.aspx?type=ln&NStoryID=13329