One of the most controversial proposals in this year’s state budget negotiations is Governor Tom Wolf’s idea to charge municipalities which have no local police departments $25 per resident for state police coverage. That’s every resident of every municipality which relies solely on state troopers.
The website pennlive.com has done a study of data from the state police and the U.S. Census Bureau to see which municipalities rely most on state police. However, there is a major caveat that skews the numbers…communities that host a state police barracks have a disproportionate number of police calls because of factors such as routine Megan’s Law registrations and fingerprint checks from neighboring municipalities.
That said, the website lists White Township, which does host a state police barracks, as the 8th most reliant on state police in the state, with 4,333 state police calls in 2015. With a population of 16,322, White Township taxpayers would be forced to pay $408,050 to the state under Governor Wolf’s proposal. The most common state police action was 304 Megan’s Law verifications.
There are no bargains in the data. Even tiny Smicksburg Borough, with a population of 45, would have to come up with $1,125. They had only four state police calls in 2015…one that was canceled, a collision, a dead animal from the road, and a welfare check.
If you’d like to see how active state police were in your municipality in 2015, visit http://www.pennlive.com/politics/index.ssf/2017/04/state_police_municipalities_fe.html.
