Public silenced at regionalization meeting

From the BCCT.

Big deal. The Emperor cuts off public opinion on a whim.

Public silenced at regionalization meeting
By: DANNY ADLER
Bucks County Courier Times

Langhorne, Langhorne Manor and Penndel officials are meeting to discuss regionalizing their police forces, but the meetings aren't open for public questions.

The five people in the audience at a meeting of officials from three small boroughs regarding a possible police regionalization were not allowed to comment or ask questions at a meeting in Penndel's borough hall Thursday night.

But the folks - consisting of three council members, a council candidate and a resident - did sit and listen.

"We're at a very preliminary stage in this study where we are just trying to determine the feasibility for each borough and that's why we have multiple members of councils and government here," Penndel Mayor Michael Sodano said during the meeting.

Last month, a Penndel resident sat through the group's meeting. At a Penndel borough council work session later in the month, a resident and a councilwoman said they thought the meetings were closed to the public.

Officials this week said the public is welcome to attend the meetings, where they discuss a recent state report outlining the benefits and cost projections if Langhorne, Langhorne Manor and Penndel choose to regionalize their police forces, but the meetings aren't open for public questions.

Melissa Bevan Melewsky, media law counsel for the Pennsylvania Newspaper Association, said the meetings should follow the state's Sunshine Act, which allows public participation.

Penndel's and Langhorne's lawyers disagree.

Langhorne solicitor Catherine Anne Porter sent an e-mail to the newspaper giving her and Penndel solicitor Don Williams' view.

"It is our opinion that the police regionalization informational sessions held at the Penndel Borough Hall are proper and appropriate," Porter wrote. "As the municipalities involved are committed to public involvement in the government, the sessions have been held in a public building, with doors open to the public and with the public permitted to attend, though not participate, in the sessions."

She says that if officials from the three municipalities decide to move forward with police regionalization and appoint representatives to an official police regionalization committee, that those meetings should fully comply with the Sunshine Act.

Melewsky doesn't see it that way. "Although the boroughs have not formally appointed a committee to render advice on the issue of police reorganization," she said Thursday, "representatives of borough council have nonetheless participated in meetings about the issue and can (or may have) render advice based on their participation in these meetings."

Penndel resident Lloyd Patton attended the meeting. Afterwards, said he always thought the meetings were closed, and was surprised to find out residents could sit through them.

But he wanted more: "I think they should have had a question-and-answer or a public comment at the end of the meeting," Patton said.

The representatives from neighboring towns stressed financial and staffing concerns during Thursday's meeting.

Langhorne Mayor Chris Blaydon said his officers wonder what will happen to them if his borough regionalizes police forces with neighboring Langhorne Manor and Penndel.

"My part-time officers are on pins and needles wondering what their fate is," Blaydon said during the group's informal, hour-long information session. He noted that the three towns have more police officers than the number that would be available under a regional department.

Other officials, including Sodano, said they hoped the boroughs could find officers within their own ranks to fill a regional department's jobs.

"I'm sure there are officers who are worthy and willing to participate," he said.

April 03, 2009 02:10 AM