Representatives from North Cornwall and North Lebanon townships informally agreed to a 50/50 apportionment split for the proposed regional police charter in a meeting Jan. 25.
The drafted charter had apportionment (article 7) determined by Police Protection Units, or PPU, with each township paying based on the amount of officer time working in that township.
Read More: Committee begins to review charter for regional police in N. Cornwall, N. Lebanon
At that time, North Cornwall chairman Mike Wahmann suggested apportioning based on population, with North Lebanon containing around 12,000 residents and North Cornwall containing around 8,000.
North Lebanon supervisor Ardy Snook was opposed to the suggestion, noting that as of now North Lebanon spends less per capita than North Cornwall.
At the closing of the December meeting, involved parties agreed to research apportionment options further.
Mike Wahmann suggested a 50/50 split of both revenues and expenditures at the start of Thursday’s meeting, which Snook and NLT supervisor Gary Heisey confirmed was agreeable to them. Wahmann said he felt this split was fair as the townships are equal partners in the merger.
However, nothing is set in stone, as when committee finishes its review of the charter, both townships’ boards of supervisors will need to approve it. The townships may still choose not to merge police departments.
A draft of the charter can be seen below. Note that the charter is only a draft and does not include changes made at the January or December meetings. An updated draft will be reviewed at the committee’s next meeting.
The committee also reviewed articles eight through 17 of the charter at Thursday’s meeting. Here are the topics of each article and the changes made from the above draft, if any.
- Article 8: Finance, change payment of funding from townships from bimonthly to monthly.
- Article 9: Capitalization, no changes.
- Article 10: Pensions, no changes.
- Article 11: Police Headquarters, no changes.
- Article 12: Police Record System, no changes.
- Article 13: Immunity and Claims, no changes, but was not properly separated from Article 12 in the draft, which will be fixed.
- Article 14: Joinder of Additional Municipalities, no changes.
- Article 15: Withdrawal of Charter Municipality, reword PPU to capital contribution.
- Article 16: Term and Dissolution, no changes.
- Article 17: Effect of Regionalization on Existing Police Departments, no changes.
The committee will review the updated version of the draft at its next meeting Feb. 22 at 3 p.m.
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