Brackenridge revises 2 ordinances for seamless police enforcement with consolidated department

In a move to streamline police operations with Tarentum, officials in Brackenridge are revising two of their ordinances.

Council last week gave Solicitor Craig Alexander the green light to prepare two draft ordinances that will mirror Tarentum’s and enable more seamless enforcement for the newly consolidated Tarentum-Brackenridge police force.

Alexander said adjusting the ordinances precludes someone cited in Brackenridge from arguing that enforcement isn’t specific to the borough’s ordinance.

One ordinance deals with curfews. The other holds property owners responsible for excessive complaint calls to the police generated from unruly or disturbing behavior by occupants of their buildings.

The biggest change is the ordinance designed to crack down on excessive police calls to the same location that become a nuisance.

Under the current Brackenridge ordinance, when police respond to more than three such calls within a month, the property owner can be cited. However, that is done by referring the complaints to the ordinance officer who issues citations that go through the district justice’s office.

“In Tarentum, the police could hold the landlord responsible,” Mayor Lindsay Fraser said. “It cuts out the middle man (ordinance officer).”

Tarentum’s version also has a limit of three such calls within a consecutive 30-day period. On the third call, the property owner is given notice that another call regarding that particular property will result in a $50 surtax levied, invoiced and collected by the police.

If a property owner fails to pay the fee, the matter is then referred to the district justice’s office for a hearing where a guilty judgment can result in a fine of up to $300 plus court costs.

On the matter of the curfew ordinance, Fraser said Brackenridge’s current ordinance requires everyone younger than 18 to be off the streets by midnight.

Alexander said the Tarentum ordinance requires anyone younger than 16 to be indoors by 10 p.m. and those 16 to 17 to be off the streets by midnight.

In another matter related to the consolidation of police services that took effect Aug. 1, council approved an ordinance that authorizes Brackenridge to enter into the intergovernmental agreement for police services with Tarentum.

“All it does is confirm that Tarentum Borough and Brackenridge Borough are one entity for police services,” Alexander said. “It clarifies what we believe is already in the agreement, but they (Tarentum officials) wanted that just so everybody knows.”

Council President Tim Connelly expressed satisfaction with how the new police arrangement is taking shape.

“Everybody’s seeing the police cars around,” he said. “It seems to be really working out for us.”

Tom Pendergast, a Brackenridge resident, told council he was “99.9% happy” with the policing agreement.

“The part that I’m not happy about is that the Brackenridge Police Department had to just vaporize,” Pendergast said.

He argued that the Brackenridge department being absorbed by the Tarentum department strips Brackenridge of some of its identity as a community. He said there have been similar arrangements elsewhere in which communities did not have to eliminate their police departments.

“The way that we did it was to get 24/7 coverage as quickly as possible,” Fraser said.

Had it been done differently, she said, it likely would have taken longer and could have resulted in a loss of jobs for borough police officers.

Connelly said Brackenridge’s officers retained their jobs and benefits, including pensions, under the agreement negotiated by the two communities.

Although it has not been described as a merger, Alexander said, “What we have is basically a 99.9% merger.

“If you would look at the agreement, you would see that Brackenridge and Tarentum are equal partners as much as possible.”