Bensalem Police, EMS Get $929K Grant To Better Police Rt. 1 Strip

BENSALEM, PA — For years, local officials have worked to have a portion of hotel taxes collected in Bensalem Township to be earmarked for use by local law enforcement efforts along the corridor where most of local hotels are situated.

As of now, those efforts have not come to fruition. But Bensalem Police and EMS will now receive funding through a $929,000 grant from the Pennsylvania Department of Community and Economic Development which officials said Thursday will go toward law enforcement and EMS functions along the Route 1 corridor, where 50 percent of Bucks County hotels are found.

Police officials said Thursday that many of the hotels situated along Route 1 are “problematic” due to the transient population that goes through those businesses. The township’s proximity to Philadelphia as it is the first turnpike interchange for the city, which makes it a haven, local officials said, for criminals to come after leaving the city.

“Bensalem has always been looking for outside the box approaches to fighting crime,” Bensalem Public Safety Director Fred Harran said in a news conference Thursday. “This (grant) just shy of a million dollars is going to help us tremendously over the next two years.”

The grant will be used to purchase equipment for local EMS officials along with license plate readers which will assist police in locating criminals who are wanted and who come out of Philadelphia and come to Bensalem. Police will also use surveillance cameras in the area to monitor the corridor and will allow the police department to put more officers on the street along the corridor at no cost to Bensalem residents, the chief said.

Harran said that $400,000 of the funds will be going toward paying overtime for officers while another $200,000 will go to purchasing equipment. A portion of the grant money will provide a new ambulance for EMS officials.

The efforts, Harran said, will assist in keeping “the criminal element” out of the township and out of nearby hotels. Township officials said Thursday that while policing the corridor was a priority in the past, the grant allows for more to be done.

The grant provides law enforcement with funding outside of local tax dollars to fight crime and to staff the Route 1 corridor, which will be done on an overtime basis, Harran said. Up until now, those costs had been absorbed by taxpayers, but the grant now allows the department to continue to fight the issue without dipping into tax money.

The state funding will also fund undercover operations to combat drug trade, human trafficking and prostitution that often occur along the corridor, officials said.

“This money will go a long way in ensuring that if you come to Bensalem with the intention of committing a crime, you will get caught and you will go to jail,” State Rep. K.C. Tomlinson said at the news conference.