Villages eye cost of police

Jessica Ablamsky

Despite tough economic times, many residents on the peninsula will see their village property tax bills rise next year.

For the villages of Great Neck Estates, Kensington, Kings Point, and Lake Success, nearly half the tab funds their police departments, whose ever-rising costs are being called increasingly into question by residents.

“When you stoplight police costs as being a significant part of the tax increase, obviously people want to find out why,” said Village of Lake Success Mayor Ron Cooper, who recently approved an 8.6 percent tax increase for the upcoming financial year.

Despite steady increases for state-mandated health care and pensions, mayors with their own village force say their officers do a better job of insuring public safety than the Nassau County Police Department, while NCPD officials admit village police can provide some services they cannot match.

At the April 11 Lake Success Trustee meeting, several of the 20 attendees brought up the village police department, which is set to cost $6.1 million next year.

Cooper said that level of interest is new.

“It’s my view that our police do a wonderful job for the residents,” he said. “I think that they provide more service to the residents than Nassau County would provide, but I understand that the cost issues are of concern. They are of concern to me as well.”

With the most expensive village police force on the peninsula, $1,026 per resident, Lake Success trustees approved $8,000 for a consultant to analyze village police needs and possible cost savings.

There is a “common thread” in tax increases, Cooper said, noting that Kings Point has a similarly high proposed tax increase of 9.8 percent and a village police department.

In Great Neck Estates, the proposed tax increase is 4.77 percent, while the Village of Kensington found a way to maintain a zero percent increase.

“We didn’t have a tax increase in this year’s budget,” said Village of Kensington Mayor Susan Lopatkin. “This is our third year holding steady. We’re very careful where we spend our money.”

Like the NCPD, the Great Neck Estates Police Department maintains a vacant house list, a practice common to village police departments. When a resident goes on vacation, or to Florida for the winter, their residence is added to a patrol list carried in each patrol car.

“We have emergency numbers to call if something happens at the house,” said Great Neck Estates Chief of Police John Garbedian. “Some people give us the oil company, the plumber, the electrician. If we see newspapers around we pick them up so the house doesn’t look vacant. We keep keys for residents in case they lock themselves out. It happens pretty often.”

Another common practice among the village police departments, the Great Neck Estates Police Department is notified directly when something sets off a house alarm. For residents served by the NCPD, alarms are monitored by a central station which Garbedian said takes longer.

“A central station is a private a company the homeowner contracts with to monitor their home,” he said.

“[Cops] driving around the village respond when they hear an alarm going off. Five minutes later we get a central station call and we say we already checked the house.”

Direct monitoring is also about a quarter of the price, he said.

In a medical emergency, which are responded to by both village and NCPD, seconds can mean lives.

With a village that is less than one mile square, response time in Great Neck Estates is between 30 seconds and one minute.

“It’s pretty instantaneous,” he said.

When an elderly Kings Point resident reported a wedding ring theft, Kings Point police responded in less than two minutes, said Village of Kings Point Mayor Michael Kalnick.

The average response time for the NCPD is three to four minutes, depending on the circumstances, time of day and day of the week, said Kevin Smith, Detective Lieutenant for the NCPD.

While village cops can give out tickets and aid in medical calls, there are some services that our outside their purview. If a detective, dog or helicopter is required, they would be provided by NCPD’s 6th Precinct. Those services are paid for by every Nassau County resident in their property tax via a headquarters tax.

Residents whose village does not have a police force, or those in the unincorporated areas, also pay a patrol tax.

Last year his 10,000 residents paid $4.1 million in patrol taxes, said Village of Great Neck Mayor Ralph Kreitzman.

That is about $410 per resident.

In the same year, Kings Point residents paid approximately $291 each – the least expensive village force on the peninsula.

“The answer is simple – they are getting better service,” Kreitzman said. “We’d like more service. If you look at Kings Point or Kensington, they have more patrol cars.”

There are six patrol cars dedicated to the Great Neck peninsula, said 6th Precinct Sergeant Robert Johnson.

In Great Neck Estates, there are always one or two cars patrolling the village’s 950 homes, Garbedian said.

Though Kreitzman is jealous of villages with their police force, Village of Thomaston Mayor Robert Stern envies no one.

He said he is “very, very satisfied with the police protection” offered by Nassau County, whose police services he does not think a village could duplicate for the price.

“They are very cooperative,” he said. “They make suggestions for security of the village before we have a problem. We act on their suggestions and we have good results.”

When the NCPD suggested Thomaston could use more street lights, he sought and won a grant to install 50 more.

“We didn’t have a lot of trouble, but now we have even less,” he said. “When my wife fell down the basement steps, they responded promptly and they were most solicitous. They took her to the hospital. They took me to the hospital to accompany her. They are very decent, hardworking guys.”

Due to negative encounters like tickets, Garbedian said many people do not want to call the police unless they have no choice.

“I think living in a small village, those positive encounters happen more often,” he said.

During a telephone interview, Lopatkin recalled one of her positive police encounters.

Before she got involved in politics, as a young mother she called the village police after an “enormous” bird got trapped in her house.

“They were here in five minutes and somehow they shooed the bird out,” she said. “You can’t measure that.”

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