A newly released audit of the Allegheny County police by the County Controller’s office examined police operations from 2013 through 2016. The Department handles police calls on County owned property (the airport, parks, the jail) and does work cooperatively with municipal police departments. This year the County police is providing contracted service to the Borough of Wilmerding (which formerly contracted with another municipality) for a flat contracted amount and a percentage of fines in the Borough resulting from the County Police’s service.
A few weeks ago, in a separate piece on the proposal for voluntary municipal disincorporation we based the count of municipalities providing their own police service “in house” through the count of active employees reported in pension data. The audit surveyed each municipality in the County (beginning on page 27 of the document) and provides a solid comprehensive examination (where municipalities did respond) on the amount of budget for police service and officer minimum and maximum salaries. The data also shows where municipalities get their police service, and our count from pension data was pretty close (98) on the municipalities providing service “in house”–by the audit’s count there are 105 municipalities providing police service in this manner. 16 contract with another municipality, 4 are part of a regional/multi-municipal force, 2 get service from the state police, and 1 from the County (Wilmerding).
That data is important for two current policy debates, the proposed $25 fee for state police coverage in municipalities that rely on the state police, and the proposal for municipal disincorporation and the decision on service quality and cost.
