Precinct vote on hold after contentious hearing

A Nassau County Public Safety Committee vote on a proposal to convert four of eight police precincts into community policing centers was postponed when shouting matches broke out between legislators on Monday.

Under the Police Precinct Efficiency Initiative, announced last week as the Community Policing Plan, the new centers would not handle administrative paperwork or criminal processing, and would see a reduction of police operating out of them, from an average of 39 officers to two.

More than 50 Police Benevolent Association members, elected leaders and residents were on hand to express concerns about the proposal, which they charged would hurt public safety in areas that would lose their precincts.

Before the committee meeting, the PBA, joined by residents and firefighters, held a news conference outside the Theodore Roosevelt Executive and Legislative building, decrying the plan.

“We’ve heard how this plan is going to put more police officers on the streets, and simply put, that is not true,” said Nassau PBA President James Carver. “The detectives are going to have twice the caseload that they previously had, which, in effect, delays the time that you have to investigate a crime.”

Milagros Vicente, of Elmont, presented 78 petition signatures that she had collected the day before. “If you’re reducing our police officers, my daughter’s life is in jeopardy,” she said. “Our neighbors’ lives are in jeopardy.”

Acting Police Commissioner Thomas Dale attended the committee meeting to answer questions about the plan and about his qualifications as commissioner. The committee approved Dale’s appointment as commissioner Monday by a vote of four to three, but the full Legislature still needs to vote on his appointment.

“When I came on board, I looked for different ways … to do more with less, and as a result of that, we came up with this plan,” Dale said. “It will not affect public safety at all.”

After Dale provided a brief explanation of the plan, which he said has been changed in small ways since it had been first announced a week ago, 20 members of the public were allowed to address the committee.