Christie, Sweeney to Meet with Camco Officials

Gov. Chris Christie and state Senate President Steve Sweeney will meet with Camden County officials next week to discuss the creation of regional police and fire departments. 

The meeting, which is not open to the public, will be held 1 p.m. Wednesday at Camden County College's Blackwood campus, in the Connector Building's Civic Hall. 

All elected officials in Camden County have been invited to the meeting. 

The visit by Christie, a Republican, is sponsored by the all-Democratic Camden County Freeholder Board. 

The freeholders are proposing countywide, shared police and fire services at least in part in response to the Christie administration's 2-percent cap on municipal and school budget increases this year.

“Government just can’t continue as-is under this new cap, and whether municipalities feel the effect of it this year, next year, or in two years, it’s coming," Freeholder Louis Cappelli Jr. said previously. "We all need to live within this 2-percent cap. This cap guarantees the way we deliver services will change in the very near future.”

If a municipality chooses to enter into such an agreement, it would first have to dissolve its own department and sign a shared-services agreement with the county.

The county would then purchase equipment and assets from the municipality, which would then pay a fee to the county for the public-safety services.

But the system could also turn out to be a hybrid, with equipment being regionalized, for example, but not necessarily forces.

The proposal to create regional police and fire departments in Camden County  is in its early stages, and no formal plan has been announced. 

Sweeney, a former Gloucester County freeholder, has pushed for New Jersey municipalities to share more services to save money. 

He previously supported Camden County's proposal to regionalize police and fire services, during a press conference in Collingswood in February. 

"We have way too much government (in New Jersey), and we are in a crisis right now," Sweeney (D-West Deptford) said at the time. "We have to find a way not to take any more police off the street, but reduce the cost and put more police and firefighters on the street to protect our citizens."

Gloucester Township Mayor David Mayer has expressed his own reservations that a countywide police or fire unit would "fit" in larger towns such as his or Cherry Hill Township or Camden.

"But that doesn't mean there aren't ways to save money (through regionalization)," he said.

Collingswood Mayor James Maley has said the borough is open to exploring the idea of regionalized police and fire services, even though a similar agreement between Collingswood and neighboring Woodlynne for shared police services failed a few years ago. 

In Camden, Mayor Dana Redd the city is considering using regional police and fire services to cover the city, following the layoffs in January of 168 city police officers and 67 firefighters due to budget woes. 

Redd announced Thursday that the city would rehire 50 of the police officers and 15 of the firefighters. The South Jersey Port Corp. is providing $2.5 million to cover the rehired public-safety staff's salaries through the end of the city's fiscal year on June 30.

Redd said the city is working on a permanent solution to keep the returning police officers and firefighters on duty past the end of June.