Town of Cornwall
CORNWALL ASKS TOWN ATTORNEY TO STUDY MERGER OF THE TOWN AND VILLAGE POLICE DEPARTMENTS:
It was studied in the mid-1980s.It was discussed again in the mid-1990s. And six years ago, a team of international experts suggested that the Town of Cornwall and the Village of Cornwall-on-Hudson merge their police departments.
No action was taken then or since, but the question of the dual departments persists.
Town Councilman Randy Clark was the latest to raise the issue.
"I have no idea why we have two police departments," Clark said recently.
Clark said he's not advocating a merger; he's just never been able to get a satisfactory answer as to why it should or shouldn't be done.
At Monday's Town Board meeting, Clark asked Town Attorney Stephen Gaba to look into the pros and cons of such a change and report back to the board. No specific deadline was given for Gaba's report.
The two departments already share dispatching services run out of the town department's headquarters.
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Town Supervisor Richard Randazzo said there's no point in forcing the issue as long as village Mayor Edward Moulton is opposed to changing the status quo. Moulton said studies have shown that combining the departments will have "no real advantage to village taxpayers." He said village residents like having the immediate response that's assured by a village-based police department.
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Six years ago, a panel of international experts brought in by the Glynwood Center — a Cold Spring-based think tank — suggested that the communities might be better served by one department. Nothing more was done at the time, but Bob DeWit, president of the Greater Cornwall Chamber of Commerce, thinks it's still an idea worth looking into, since it came from people with "no preconceived notions" about the town and village.Questions that seem to come up whenever a merger is discussed are: Who would be in charge of the department? Would both municipal boards have a say? Or would it have to be a town-run department, as Randazzo suggested the other night?