I Was Wrong. They Do Have an Agenda.

Last night, the outgoing Commission had its last business meeting.  The urgent matter was approving the second reading of an Ordinance, but a few other matters were added, to get them off the books and into action.  One of those matters was the commitment the Village already intended, to acquire four new police vehicles.  There are four that are very high mileage and increasingly low reliability, the maintenance costs for them exceed the cost of a lease-purchase, the money was already set aside in the new budget, and all we had to do is place the final stamp of approval on the commitment.  The matter was listed in the Consent part of the Agenda, because it wasn't worth discussion.  Or so we assumed.

We received a letter from one of the Commissioners-elect, Jenny Johnson-Sardella, telling us why this matter should not be considered by the outgoing Commission.  It involved an expense, and Jenny proposed that it was not properly publicized.  Jenny couldn't be at the meeting, for reasons she did not specify.

Tracy Truppman, another Commissioner-elect, was there, and she said the same thing Jenny did.  Will Tudor, the other Commissioner-elect and "three-pack" member, wasn't there.

Jenny and Tracy had outgoing Commissioner Barbara Watts to add muscle for them, and Barbara took the matter off the Consent Agenda, so we would have to discuss it.

As I said, this matter has been discussed before.  It was discussed a few months ago, when the budget was approved.  The reason to cycle out old, high-mileage, and low-reliability police cruisers is that they cost too much to maintain, and they're not reliable.  These are emergency vehicles we're talking about.  Emergency vehicles that are not reliable is not a good thing.  So on the surface of it, there was no reason not to go forward with the intention, as we had already planned and for which we had made fiscal room, and the sooner, the better.  These cars take many months to complete, because they are specially equipped.  They're much more expensive than similar models for sale at car dealerships.

The only reason not to move ahead with this plan last night was to preserve the opportunity to cancel it.  And since cancelling the intention to order these cruisers is the one and only possible outcome of delaying the order, then it must be the reason two of our Commissioners-elect, and one outgoing Commissioner, wanted the delay.

We're then left to wonder why they would want to cancel such an order.  It can't be that police cruisers are considered trivial or unnecessary.  We very typically clamor for more police action and visibility and effectiveness.  It can't be saving money.  Repairing old cruisers, apart from keeping them unreliable and unavailable, costs more than paying the lease on new vehicles.

But there is one reason the new Commission might want us not to have new cruisers.  Tracy Truppman has told us what that reason is.  Tracy has decided, for whatever are her reasons, that we should cut back what she somehow understands or imagines our police expense to be, by no longer offering our officers take-home vehicles.  So presumably, Tracy, with the apparent agreement of Jenny and Barbara, has calculated that the fewer police cruisers we have, the less available they are to be provided as take-homes to our officers.  This is apparently Tracy's, and Jenny's and Barbara's, idea of an end run around the contracted commitment we made to our police officers, providing a take-home vehicle as a consolation or compensation for underpaying them.

And let's say, just for purpose of discussion, that Tracy and Jenny and Barbara had a point worth looking at.  Let's suppose that if we have fewer vehicles, and they're not very good, that we would have grounds not to be able to spare them for our officers to take home.  The theory about police officers taking home their cruisers versus not taking them home, apart from how the officers feel about it, is that if officers take home their vehicles, then municipalities have to have more vehicles available.  And the vehicles are only used when the given officer is on duty, or when he or she is commuting to and from the Village.  If officers don't take home their cruisers, and have to use their personal cars to commute to and from work, then the municipality needs fewer cruisers, and those cruisers are used continuously, by whoever is on duty each shift.  So one scheme requires more vehicles, which are spared when officers are off duty, and the other scheme requires fewer vehicles, which wear out much sooner, because they're used much more heavily.  Most knowledgeable people who calculate this conclude that it's essentially a wash, with the difference represented by the consolation or compensation experienced by the officers.  And since our officers-- the ones we underpay-- have been more or less content to accept the take-home vehicles as consolation or compensation enough, that's what we do.  It's in their PBA contract with us.

But here's the other problem, and the real problem, with Jenny's and Tracy's and Barbara's proposal.  Setting aside how not nice and not respectful and not honorable it is.  If we don't have newer police cruisers, then we have older police cruisers.  Those are the unreliable ones, that eat up more money in repairs than it would cost to replace them.  It means that when you or I have an emergency, and we need police help, we might not get it, if a cruiser won't start, or dies on the way to us.  It completely defeats the entire purpose of an emergency vehicle.

So last night, we went ahead with our lease commitment.  Bob Anderson wasn't there, and the vote to make the commitment was 3-1, with Barbara Watts representing her incoming replacements, who are trying to figure out a way to squeeze the BP police department.  This was what Tracy told us she would try to do, it's the way she said she'd try to do it, and she's been good for her agenda.