Richfield Township Board of Trustees Special

June 28, 2001

Public Hearing scheduled on the Richfield Township Police Department was called to order at 7:35 p.m.

 Roll Call:  Trustees - Robert Hooper, Shano Cica-Mraz and Robert Luther

                Clerk / Treasurer - Mark Uhrich

 Others present: Laurie Gilmore - Office Administrator; Chief Arbogast, Safety Advisory Committee (SAC) members: Phil Sipos, Jeff Shupe, Ralph Schneider and Paul Lukas.

 Mr. Hooper – Reviewed how the police service, if combined with Richfield Village, would save money, increase officers on patrol per shift and increase officer safety. A summary of the Safety Committee activities was presented:

Started in January 2001, performed extensive analysis, and explored all options and reasons for merging the police forces. They presented their findings to the Trustees on June 6, 2001 with a unanimous recommendation to merge with the Village of Richfield’s Police Department.

Mr. Sipos, Safety Advisory Chair Person, spoke on behalf of the SAC – He described the process: They preformed interviews, issued questionnaires, and gathered data for analysis. Had discussions and gathered information with all officers, Chief Arbogast, Chief Walsh (Village of Richfield Police Chief), dispatchers, Fire Chief.

 Pat Coleman, an outside consultant hired by the SAC to assist them in processing the information and form recommendations, spoke: He emphasized that the absolute best thing a police officer can have, is another police officer as back-up. His opinion was that Richfield Township’s Police Department was under staffed, as all shifts have just one officer on duty at a time. The best option for Richfield Township was to increase the number of officers on patrol.

 Mr. Tom Wehner, 5020 West Streetsboro Rd., wants to hear from Chief Arbogast.

Jeff Smola, 4681 Alger Road, wanted to know the relationship of Brecksville PD budget and its population and Richfield Township’s PD budget and population.

Mr. Coleman responded by stating the FBI recommends 2.7 officers per 1,000 population.

Mr. Anthony Marzola, 5220 Dakota, wanted to know “where is my patrolman?” He stated he had better coverage from Summit Count Sheriff’s Department then he has now with Township patrols.

Mr. Hooper responded by stating that increased staffing accomplished by merging with the Village Police would increase patrols.

Mr. Stephen Schmidt, 3124 Wheatley, Township Law versus Village law, there are differences, how would that work? Has anybody considered Bath Township or any other community’s Police Department to merge with?

Mr. Coleman responded – indicating the current dispatcher for EMS and Fire is through the village and keeping this central dispatcher, for police calls, would be a benefit.

Mr. Hooper responded – We are negotiating with the Village of Richfield. The first step in this process is to evaluate price. If the price is not good, we may explore negotiations with other communities.

Mr. Luther spoke. He wants to hire more officers. He felt that one car on patrol per shift is OK. The Chief does his best to have overlap shifts; the Township Police have state of the art communication and computer equipment. As far as back up, he felt that, for example, if an officer was in situation with a motorist and if an officer has a really bad feeling about the situation, the officer should let the motorist go. In the past, he felt Richfield Township received bad service from the Sheriff’s department.

Ms. Cica-Mraz spoke – She acknowledges that were other options than to merge police departments, but the most realistic and cost effective option was to merge with the Village PD. The trustees received an objective recommendation from the SAC and outside consultant. In addition, there were performance and administrative issues within the Richfield Township PD. Some of these issues were: When Richfield Township patrol cars are being used outside of the community, such as going to Sagamore Hills dispatch, there are no patrol cars left in the Township; poor discipline; low wage structure; lack of supervision for officers; Trustees authorized Chief to hire two new officers in the fall of 2000, but only one was hired; lawsuits from interviewed officers candidates, no police chief on duty during days as our current chief has a day job.

Mr. Sipos spoke – Prior to making a recommendation to the trustees, the SAC set objectives:  Increase police presence in the community, increase officer safety, avoid tax increases, and secure written mutual aid agreements, minimize response time, develop a healthier and safer work schedule, increase wages to competitive levels, attract top quality police candidates, and maximize the use of grants. Also, retain all officers and the Chiefs job with no loss of tenure, pension, and wages; dispatch through the village.

Mr. Hooper opened the meeting up to the public for a question and answer session:

Mr. George Chanideulous, 3161 Forest Run Dr., was comforted by the Richfield Township PD reports he receives when while vacation. Why is Richfield Township paying for half of the tennis court renovation when we could be putting this money towards the Police Department?

Ms. Kit Kelly, Sun Newspaper reporter, Question for Pat Coleman. Your first recommendation was to increase staff and your second was to merge departments?

Mr. Coleman’s response – yes, but it appeared to be too much cost involved with hiring additional staff and the most cost effective option would be to merge.

Mr. Bob Anderson, 4358 Oviatt Road, How can we do it with less money for more services? (How can the merger of Police departments save the Township money and increase service?) Richfield Township should evaluate assistance options instead of a merger. Wants to keep the value of his vote.

Mr. Hooper responded – Increased staff and increased police presence would occur through a merger of departments.

Mr. Pat Coleman responded – In regards to assistance options: a couple concerns regarding assistance, 1) The community coming to assistance may have many stops to make on the way to assist and therefore, timely assistance would not occur, 2) You have to call for assistance, with additional officers already on patrol they would provide back-up assistance as a matter of routine.

Mr. John Meyer, 4678 Broadview Rd., he was a security consultant for the Cleveland Museum of Natural History and agrees with committee recommendation to merge Police Departments. He sees it as a win-win situation.

Mr. Rich Flemming, 4678 Columbia Rd., What date was Pat Coleman’s report submitted to the Trustees?

Mr. Coleman – March 26

A resident of 5151 Townsend, Could Richfield Township use more part-timers? How would traffic violations and fines be handled?

Mr. Hooper responded – Part-Timers still would be costly and we are exploring how to handle the traffic fines.

Mr. Coffey, 5150 Alger, Does the Village still have low band dispatch? Response - No

Mr. Tom Johnson, 2788 Stubbins, our community is always growing. What good is only one officer on patrol per shift?

Mr. Jess Cola, 4168 Alger, What is the cost of expansion verses the cost of the merger?

Mr. Hooper responded – It wouldn’t cost Richfield Township anymore than it does now to merge departments.

Mr. Tom Wehner, 5020 Streetsboro, We would become subservient to the Village. I, as a taxpayer, if I want to pay more taxes, I’ll pay. I (Richfield Township) want to control the department – I’ll pay more taxes. We should solve this within the community. The trustees shouldn’t decide for us if we want to pay more taxes. I would like to see one police district formed between the village and township.

Mr. Brian Bonus, 3170 Streetsboro Rd., The township wants to be left alone; the village will make us pay for their water and sewer.

Mr. David Beech, 4189 Broadview, Has the Village given us a cost yet?

Mr. Hooper response – No, but the framework for negotiations is to be equal to or less than the current cost.

Becky Sheryak, 3105 Brush wants to keep control within the township, we should put it out for competitive bids. Would like to see the issue on the ballot.

Mr. Tom Emmett, 3065 Streetsboro Rd., What about the assets Richfield Township has paid for?

Mr. Hooper responded – We are working on that issue in the negotiation process.

Mr. Charlie Easton, 5168 Streetsboro, the village would get short changed in this deal; we should look at hiring new officers. Why the village has so many police officers? According to him, 4.3 per thousand when the FBI recommends 2.7.  The Township should just hire two more officers, that’s all we need.

Gail Luther, 5126 Alger, It took 9 days to get the minutes from the January SAC meeting.  Would like to receive a copy of SAC’s report. Is this Police contract related to the JEDD?

Mr. Hooper responded -- No

Ms. Gilmore, Township Administrator, wanted to clarify a point regarding the formation of the Township police department ten years ago, nobody voted on the formation, the trustees at that time voted to form a police department, the only thing the residents voted on were levies to fund the police department.

Mr. Tom Moran, 4439 Black Rd., Thanked the Trustees for forming this committee. Wanted to know how much time the township police spend driving through the village.

 Mr. George Strongosky, 3851 Robin Hill Lane, What really frightened him was a comment made earlier (by Trustee Luther) that if an officer stops a perpetrator and has a bad feeling about the situation, he is going to let perpetrator go.

Mr. David Arbogast, Police Chief Richfield Township, We just had a wage increase; we are now in the middle of the pack for police wages. Written Mutual Aid agreements are being secured. There are two separate legal entities, Village and Township, how traffic violations will be handled needs to be determined. The Village police incur OT. Citied crime statistics regarding the improved crime rates in the Township. Richfield Township Police have better communication with other entities. Regardless the course of action taken, he will support the decision.

Mr. Hooper made a motion to adjourn the meeting at 9:50 p.m., seconded Ms. Mraz, Yes -Ms. Mraz and Mr. Hooper, motion carried by majority.