Police and fire dispatch duties will be shifted to the Monmouth County Sheriff’s office, borough officials said.
By DUSTIN RACIOPPI
Abandoning a plan hatched in controversy, Fair Haven won’t be teaming up with Little Silver to share dispatch services after all, borough officials said Monday night.
Instead, the borough will outsource its emergency call operations to Freehold.
After more than eight months of research and discussion with its neighbor to the south, Fair Haven officials decided to terminate an agreement entered in March to share dispatch services with Little Silver because the radio technology wasn’t working in Fair Haven. Those issues have since been rectified, Mayor Michael Halfacre said, but the council wasn’t fully satisfied.
“The problems have been resolved, but it’s not the type of dispatch that Fair Haven bought into back in February/March,” Halfacre said. “We’re at a juncture now where we have a decision to make.”
It was a nearly unanimous one: sign a contract with Monmouth County, which was once a front runner to take over the borough’s dispatching before Little Silver emerged late in the game with a cheaper offer that was also closer. The Monmouth County Sheriff’s Communication Center is located more than a half-hour away in Freehold.
But the council insists that distance won’t make any difference in service or cause any delay in response times. The county center provides services for 45 municipalities, according to its website.
In fact, Councilman and Police Commissioner Christopher Rinn, who also works with a regional dispatch center in Hudson County, says that having the county take Fair Haven’s 911 calls will benefit the borough with better technology, a robust quality control system and the comfort of knowing the county center is nationally accredited.
“The county is a prudent, tried and true, and trusted dispatch center,” he said. “It gives us a viable solution immediately that has been tested.”
The county service is expected to come at a cost comparable to Little Silver’s charges, too. Rinn said the contract with the county will be around $55,000 and will save Fair Haven about $100,000 annually. The Little Silver contract was $42,000, according to earlier reports.
Although the switch to Monmouth County was recommended by the borough’s upper echelon of emergency responders, it was clear when the issue was discussed last night that local civil servants were peeved that dispatch operations aren’t staying put.
Fair Haven Fire Company Chief Shaun Foley and Deputy Chief Jim Cerruti made a last-ditch effort to sway the council into bringing the call center back home, and the Policemen’s Benevolent Association went on the record as disapproving of the move.
But “the train’s out of the station,” and the shift to shared services is inevitable, said Councilman Ben Lucarelli.
Councilman John Lehnert, a borough firefighter, conceded that notion, but not happily.
“We were doing fine for at least 20 years,” he said. “We’re not going back to dispatch out of Fair Haven. I wish we could.”
it’s a shame. i called 911 for the first time almost 10 years ago when my town’s service was threaded through cty on what must have been a very busy sat night. no one picked up my call. and when they did call me back, i needed to give directions to my apt in a large complex. waiting a minute for help seems like a lifetime when you are certain you are about to die. my town dispatch would have picked up immediately, and would have known where i lived.
All 911 calls have gone through the county for over a decade.
Well done FH. Now if only we the people could consolidate those pesky and expensive educational services, like superintendents and their ever increasing minions…that might actually help us flat-line property taxes…
Nemo has a great point actually. How crazy is it that these local politicians are going after emergency services meant to protect our lives when 61% of our property taxes are wasted on Superintendents making 150k+ a year & maintenance supervisors making over 100k a year… I guess educating our youth is more important than protecting the lives of our residents. There is a TON of money waiting to be reclaimed by revamping our educational systems in this state…
They should streamline the way cases are prosecuted in the Municipal Courts here in New Jersey. Career prosecutors from the county prosecutor’s office should prosecute cases in both the Superior and Municipal Courts. It’s a disgrace that people like Mayor Mike Halfacre are able to feed at the public trough by becoming the municipal prosecutor in several neighboring towns. The current system is terribly inefficient. It also reeks of corruption.
Whenever I think of all of Mike Halfacre’s public jobs, I am reminded of that skit on In Living Color about the guy with 15 jobs. “What? You only have 8 jobs? Oh, you lazy goat!”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jpu5_3qk4KM
Gee Rush, oops I mean Kelly, your smear isn’t too transparent, is it?
And Belmar Mayor Ken Pringle is the municipal attorney for Red Bank, and Mayor Pat (Pasquale) Menna was the municipal attorney of Aberdeen before they fired him.
It is an incestuous, horrible, back slapping political class that has gotten us in this situation on both sides of the isle republican and democrat. They feed off of it, become fat and happy.
We sit by like potted plants allowing ourselves to be fertilized by the bull sh*t they throw us and it gets worse and worse. If collectively we would stop being so partisan and recognize it’s the political class we are fighting instead of each other we would be miles ahead of where the change we could all believe in has taken us. Unions, Politicians and their fanatical followers are going to be our undoing.
Halfacre has had his hand in the taxpayer’s cookie jar much of his adult life. Listening to him ramble on about how government should reduce spending is like listening to Charles Manson tell us that something needs to be done about crime.
JD - you said “I guess educating our youth is more important than protecting the lives of our residents”.
Fact is, when it comes to public education, it’s all about the ridiculous teacher’s union, the NJEA, corruption, and MONEY. It has absolutely nothing to do with education. Sad, but true.
Oh, but hang on… Corzine is going to cut all government budgets EXCEPT the DOE, cause geez, he’s all for “education”, right? What total BS.
We try to fabricate a correlation between education funding and student performance, when the only correlation is between funding and the number of administrators driving luxury cars.
According to data universe Halfacre makes $9,935 in Little Silver. IIRC, the mayor and council don’t get paid anything in fair haven, unlike our lovely RB. Hardly living high on the hog off that public salary.
Also, unlike our lovely RB, fair haven has had thier municipal taxes go down.
Whaaaat just happened? Looks like this was the plan all along! Who pays all the money for the equipment and time we paid to the cops to dispatch after they fired all the dispatchers? Will the police chief get a performance bounus for this?
Somebody should loose their job for this! Fair Haven seems to have a lawsuit. Councilman Lehnert had better not be a fireman on permanent disability from Fair Haven police force. Paid with benifits.
Fair Haven taxes went down when? They reduced municipal tax 1/2 cent while school tax went up 9 cents. Where do you see taxes going down? Check your facts cookiejar!
If the cops don’t want it and the fire department does’nt want it, are those responsible for the changes going to be held liable if there is a problem? Should’nt the residents concerns be adressed? Time to clean house. Get rid of the good ol boys. I’d rather have the old guy who sang and played the f**ken piano. Start with Halfass and the pension scamming Lenert. oh and the self serving yacht club Koch!
First off John Lenert is not on the fire department he is the Fire commisionor which is an assignment through the town council. HE is not scamming anyone he is actualy one of the better people on that crappy council. THe article posted his position wrong. Don’t believe everything you read.
Hey, Cookiejar, it’s not the pittance of a public salary that’s killing taxpayers, it’s the PENSION OBLIGATIONS and APPOINTMENT JOBS once these crooks are in the system. Why do you think all these cronies have jobs working for each others’ towns?
You scratch my back, I scratch yours, and send the bill to Joe Taxpayer.
The lack of knowledge on this site about property taxes is amazing. The school board controls the school taxs, and the town controls the town taxes. The public votes on the school taxes, so the increase in your school taxes are your own fault. Go to a school board meeting and cry about your taxes, it makes up 60% or more of your tax bill.
Data Universe is full of inaccurate data. It neglects to mention, for example, “a few” of Michael Halfacre’s public jobs. (And saying that Mayor Halfacre receives “a few” public paychecks is being diplomatic.) If you doubt that, call the Municipal Court in Rumson and ask them who the prosecutor is in that town. Who knows? Maybe Michael Halfacre will also be the court clerk that answers the phone when you call.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_s53GE-3Cx0
So, Hedly, your saying that an anonymous post on rbg is more accurate than data universe? That is funny.
Yes, that is precisely what I’m saying.
Lenert seems to be one of the better ones, however is he going to sit on his hands and vote along party lines when we need a voice around here? He knows he’ll be gone with no Republican money next election. Big John let everybody know the PD f’d up. He can’t fire you now!
Does Rumson pay into the pension system for its prosecutor? Little Silver apparently does (so Halfacre’s job appears), but Red Bank, for example, does not. (Menna stopped the practice recently.)
So it may be true that Halfacre has several prosecutorial posts, it would appear that only one of those posts is paying into the pension system.
That’s OK for him, though: a year working part-time counts toward vesting, and his pension will be based on the highest 3 years of employment, so he can work part-time for 17 years, then take a political job that pays $50,000 or so for 3 years, and he’ll get the same pension as someone who worked full-time for 20 years.
That’s my understanding of it, anyway. If I’m wrong, I hope someone will correct me.