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Randolph votes down plan to reestablish police department - VTDigger
RANDOLPH — Voters in the Randolph Police District have rejected a plan to spend $771,000 on reestablishing the town’s police department.
The measure, which failed in a 227-136 vote at this week’s annual Town Meeting, would have required raising almost $500,000 in property taxes from inside the town’s central “police district.”
Until February, Randolph had a 120-hour-per-week contract with the Orange County Sheriff’s Department for policing — the sheriff’s largest. But following a tumultuous transition in which voters ousted the former sheriff, Bill Bohnyak, and 17 of the department’s 21 deputies left along with him, the new sheriff, George Contois, was forced to end his department’s Randolph patrols for lack of staff.
“We need to make a short-term decision,” Trini Brassard, chair of Randolph’s Selectboard, said of the town’s need to figure out its policing future after the local police plan was rejected this week.
✓ Randolph had its own police department of six full-time officers up until 2018, but the department died by attrition after its entire rank gradually resigned. Randolph then began contracting with the Orange County sheriff, selling its police equipment to the county-wide law enforcement agency. All that remained of the police department was its building, which is still owned by the town.
Despite the vote on Tuesday, Randolph still plans to get its own police department started. Because the town’s current budget runs until July, Randolph can fund its department through the money that would have gone to the sheriff’s department. The town has also used American Rescue Plan Act funds to get the department off the ground.
Currently, Vermont State Police are providing patrols in Randolph, but have warned the town that state patrols are not a long-term solution, Brassard said. There was a delay in receiving a federal identification number for the town’s police department, according to Brassard, pushing back the date on which the department could start patrols.
Now, the town needs some final help from the state to launch, and Brassard said the department hopes to be up and running as soon as the end of the week.
But what exactly Randolph's police department will look like still requires hashing out..." READ MORE
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Randolph rejects resurrecting police department
RANDOLPH, Vt. (WCAX) - Voters in Randolph Tuesday said “no” to re-establishing the local police department.
The final tally was 227 to 136 yes. About 1,500 people living in what’s known as the “Police District” in town would have paid the nearly $500,000 bill.
The department shut down in 2018 and the town hired the Orange County Sheriff’s Office $300,000 to fill the gaps. But the Sheriff recently pulled out of the town contract due to its own staffing problems. Vermont State Police are providing some coverage right now.
It’s one of several towns that has debated the need for local police. Waterbury residents in 2017 opted to get rid of their local force when the town and village merged.
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