Lately there has been a lot of discussion about the Copake Police force. Some think cutting the hours is a good place to save money. Others feel cutting it would be an invitation for more crime.
There is a third option and that is to mere the Copake police into the County Sheriffs organization. It is something that is not new and is similar to what is under consideration in Hamilton County, Ohio. Hamilton County includes the city of Cincinnati, and many other small municipalities. Norwood, Ohio is an example. It measures just one mile by two mile or about 1200 acres.
While Copake is much bigger in size than Norwood, it has many less people making efficiency policing harder to achieve. Merging the smaller police forces has been tried around Louisville, Kentucky too. The experience in Louisville has been that it did not save any money, but did improve the efficiency and quality of policing. Merging the Copake Police into the County Sheriffs office should offer similar results. There is little question a larger police force can offer better training, more flexibility in scheduling with better utilization of equipment. By merging the Copake Police the town would not save money but would improve the quality of policing.
Grant
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