“The Level of Service Will Not be the Same”

Unnamed officials made the comment in the title a couple of weeks ago when asked about police coverage in our small town. And they didn’t mean that service would be better. Far from it.

On April 11th, the Town Commissioners swore in a Police Chief who will live 45 minutes away, who has implied he will maintain bankers’ hours, and who speaks about the love for his current hometown while seemingly feeling little for the town he will be tasked to serve and protect other than the value of his paycheck. * (Editor’s Note: To be fair, the new Chief stated tonight at his swearing in that he told his wife to expect some long hours and weekends at his new job. He also was very appreciative of the opportunity.)

But, hey, if disaster happens, the State Police and the Sheriff’s Department are on call and if they can tear themselves away from duties in other areas, will be here as soon as they can. And the new chief said he would “work really hard.”

Maybe we shouldn’t expect anything more than that. Maybe our town doesn’t deserve more than that. Maybe this new chief is perfect for this town, a good guy who will patrol the town on his bike and make sure things look fine. He’ll do this for eight hours a day.

Maybe we shouldn’t expect more. We could say that if we hadn’t provided for a home for a police chief and his family to live in as part of his hiring. We could say that if the salary wasn’t great. But, neither of those things are true.

We could say that if the town had adequately advertised the position and interviewed many different candidates. But they didn’t. How do we know? We know because we asked and the Commissioners wouldn’t answer. They just sat there staring off into space. Confidentiality, don’t you know. Had to ask their lawyer if they could answer that.

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