New Clarkstown Admin Wants to Review Police Operations

The new administration at Clarkstown Town Hall is interested in taking a look at police operations, including overtime and pensions, according to The Journal News.

To do so, the board would hire a consultant, the paper reports.

The Clarkstown Police Department is the second-highest paid department in the state, according to the Empire Center’s most recent “What They Make” report. The report uses pay data reported to the New York State and Local Retirement System (NYSLRS) between April 1, 2014 and March 31, 2015. The wages listed do not include fringe benefits such as health insurance or employer pension contributions, which can add 35 percent or more to the cost for taxpayers.

On lohud.com editor Robert Brum’s Facebook post to Clarkstown Community, commenter CMPravda offered some details about the police department’s costs.

Clarkstown’s annual PENSION COSTS are more than $7.2 million of the annual $50M budget for staff of 186 (162 officers & 24 admins, according to the town.) Its cops patrol about 47 square miles in a town of almost 86,000 people. (1826 people/sq mile) with a cost of +$150,000 for legacy pensions which is equivalent to approximately 47 full-time retired officers in perpetuity)

and

2013-2016 Clarkstown Budget DETAILS available for REVIEW @ (pg#34 Police Budget & Ovetimes $30M of pg#108 TOTAL $104M Revenues) http://town.clarkstown.ny.us/PDF/2016_Adopted_Budget.pdf

Read the complete article on lohud.com.

The town of Clarkstown has the second-highest average pay statewide for general employees as well as police and fire. Four years of raises for its 300 workers in the CSEA were approved by the outgoing administration.