Jack Martins, the Republican Nassau County executive candidate, said he would undo the controversial merger of the North Shore’s two police precincts if elected, joining Democrats in support of the move.
Martins, a former state senator from Old Westbury, last Friday called for the Police Department to fully reopen the 6th Precinct in Manhasset, which the county folded into Williston Park’s 3rd Precinct in 2012.
The move would give the northern part of the current 3rd Precinct more locally sensitive and responsive police service following a merger that has not produced the promised benfits, Martins said in a statement last Friday.
“We have an obligation to protect the quality-of-life we enjoy in communities across Nassau County,” Martins said in the statement. “Given the results of this consolidation plan, I believe there are compelling reasons to reopen the Sixth Precinct and return this local police presence to Manhasset and the surrounding area.”
The 3rd Precinct merger was one of four proposed in 2012 in an effort to save a total of $20 million. Only two of them were completed; the other two were abandoned.
The merged 3rd Precinct covers an area stretching from the Village of Manorhaven south to Hempstead Turnpike, and from the Queens border east to Glen Cove Road.
The former 6th Precinct building on Community Drive in Manhasset has remained open as a “community policing center” where residents can report crimes, and as the headquarters of the Police Department’s Highway Patrol Unit.
Community leaders and local officials have called for the return of a fully staffed 6th Precinct since December 2015, saying local police service is less responsive than before in what is now called the 3rd North Subdivision.
Democratic elected officials, including North Hempstead Town Supervisor Judi Bosworth and county Legislator Ellen Birnbaum, have backed that campaign.
But County Executive Edward Mangano, a Republican, and Thomas Krumpter, the acting police commissioner whom Mangano appointed, have maintained that the mergers have saved money as major crime has dropped 27 percent since 2009.
The department has maintained the same number of daily patrols as before the merger, Krumpter has said.
“The closing of the 6th [Precinct] has had no impact on crime or police operations and has resulted in savings of over 5 million dollars per year,” Det. Lt. Richard LeBrun, the Police Department’s top spokesman, said in an email.
Mangano said last year that he would be open to reopening the precinct as long as the county’s three police unions would make concessions on staffing levels to keep costs down.
Martins’ support for undoing the merger comes in the early stages of his campaign to replace Mangano, who has lost GOP support following his indictment in October on federal corruption charges. He has pleaded not guilty.
The three Democratic candidates for Mangano’s job — county Legislator Laura Curran, state Assemblyman Charles Lavine and county Comptroller George Maragos — all said they support reopening the 6th Precinct.
Maragos said he has held that position “for years,” and Lavine said its closure was “the result of mismanagement by the county Republicans.”
Philip Shulman, a Curran spokesman, chastised Martins for his previous silence on the issue, saying he is “only changing his tune now when it benefits him politically.”
E. O’Brien Murray, Martins’ campaign strategist, said Curran was just as guilty of staying silent as the ranking Democratic member of the Legislature’s Public Safety Committee.
Sue Auriemma, an officer in the Council of Greater Manhasset Civic Associations who has led the group’s fight to reopen the precinct, said she was pleased to hear Martins supports the move.
Having a county executive to push for undoing the merger would help get the area more locally focused police leadership, which is lacking with the 3rd Precinct’s headquarters so far away.
“The average resident may not understand how important it is to have our own precinct … but it’s about how the leadership in the community interfaces with the leadership at the precinct,” Auriemma said.
Officer James McCormack, president of the Nassau Police Benevolent Association, did not return a phone call seeking comment.
