Ossining PBA Wants Village Board to Postpone Court Consolidation

The Ossining Village Board of Trustee’s has abolished the Village Justice Court and one of the biggest groups opposed the upcoming court consolidation is the Ossining Police Department and the Police Benevolent Association. The reason for their ire; a comment made last week by Town Supervisor Catherine Borgia regarding the Prisoner Transportation Agreement; a decision made without consulting the Village Police Department that handles that matter.

At last week’s joint meeting with the town and the village, Town Supervisor Catherine Borgia said that the responsibility of prisoner transport would be handled by the county instead of the local police force. This is a point that Police Benevolent Association President Detective Don Farrell felt should be decided on before the consolidation should go through; especially since the local police have been handling that responsibility for years. In fact, the Village Board of Trustees recently re-signed the Prisoner Transportation Agreement with the county for another year.

“We as an association want the Village Board to postpone approval of the court consolidation. We request that you work out the details with all those affected prior to approving this measure. You see, in public safety the devil is in the details and entering into an agreement without first working out the details is a bad idea,” said Detective Don Farrell, President of the Police Benevolent Association. “At last Wednesday’s public meeting the Town Supervisor, Catherine Borgia, stated that Westchester County Police Officers will be conducting all prisoner transports for proposed consolidated court. Today, we were told that this might not be true. What is happening right now is a rushed, sloppy attempt at putting the courts together in order to meet a legislative deadline.”

Under the Prisoner Transportation Agreement with the county, the local police department will be compensated for transporting prisoners between the court and the Westchester County Jail in Valhalla.

“We, the Officers of the Village of Ossining Police Department, have been the primary law enforcement agency in this community for over 100 years. Not including us in this decision making process stinks of politics at the expense of public safety,” said Farrell. “While losing the prisoner transport function would be devastating enough to our membership, contracting another police agency, one that has a significantly higher pay scale than us, to do our work in our building is offensive to our members. Further, contracting another police agency with higher paid officers to service this court is irresponsible to our tax payers.”

Ossining Mayor William Hanauer insisted that nothing was decided regarding the prisoner transport issue and that Borgia simply misspoke.

“The Supervisor misspoke,” Hanauer said. ”This is the option the town might have …to have the county police do it—we have to discuss this topic in executive session to see.”

The lack of having all the details worked out caused one of the village trustee’s to change their mind, resulting in a 4 to 1 roll call vote.

“Last year I stood before the press and said I was for court consolidation,” said Village Trustee Janis Castaldi. “But it was too soon… now as much as I am for Court Consolidation, I’m walking the line now… why weren’t all these details worked out a year ago? I just can’t in all honestly to vote for this to pass.”

“Allowing the Town Board to use the Village of Ossining to further their political agenda is detrimental to this community. This Board must do what’s right and postpone the court consolidation until a functional agreement can be worked out that treats the village residents just as fairly as those in the town outside,” said Farrell. “The village’s court is in better financial shape than the town’s. This merger will bailout the town’s court. Are the village taxpayers really prepared to provide a “bailout” to the town taxpayers?”