Tuesday, October 16, 2018
Trustee chairman says belt tightening has come to an end
AUSTINTOWN
Austintown Township trustees are asking voters next month to approve a 3.2-mill police levy that will generate $1,990,583 annually.
Of that figure, 0.8 mills is additional funding to offset state budget cuts to the township, and 2.4 mills is replacement.
It would increase the annual cost to the owner of a $100,000 home from $51.92 to $112 if approved in November.
Jim Davis, township trustee chairman, said the police department provides services above and beyond what you would typically receive in other communities, including services such as lockouts, vacation checks, heat safety checks and private property crashes.
“We try to provide the best public safety we can for residents of the community and businesses, but we can’t continue to do that with depleted funds. We’ve lost nearly $6 million from the state of Ohio [which is] taking away from local government, putting the money into the rainy-day fund in Columbus.”
Although Austintown has been able to sustain itself through grants and good budgeting practices thus far, Davis said the belt tightening has come to an end.
“Eventually, it’ll effect residents when we can’t provide services we want to anymore,” Davis said.
Austintown police department has 40 full-time officers including the chief.
A patrolman’s average annual salary is 60,193 not including overtime and $63,181 including overtime.
The police department’s total budget for 2017 was approximately $5.5 million; $740,000 of that came from the township’s general fund.
Township Administrator Mike Dockry said the board is asking for the levy to just maintain services.
“In all my years here, all boards have prioritized police funding, and rightly so,” Dockry said. “As a result, other township services are reduced to the extent that police-levy funds are not sufficient to fund police operations. For example, if the $740,000 from the general fund in 2017 was not needed to fund police operations, it could have funded more road resurfacing.”
Staffing levels are also related to maintaining services.
“As staff levels decline, it not only impacts traditional police services, but it also makes it more difficult to continue with programs such as Senior Watch, Crime Watch, DARE, vehicle lockouts, bank escorts and more,” Dockry said.
Police Chief Robert Gavalier said there are many items that fall within the police budget that need replaced, as well. These include two police dogs, 55 radios that are about 15 years old and a record-management system that is more than 15 years old.
The cost to replace the radios and the record-management system is about $4,500 per radio and $120,000, respectively.
Up until this point, the police department has been utilizing shared services and grants to pay for various needs, Gavalier noted.
“Over the last few years, we’ve obtained over $1 million in grants for equipment and officers,” he said. “We went together with Boardman and the county on a radio system to help cut costs. We’ve partnered in our dispatching to help cut costs.”