Jim Thorpe Earth Day planners discuss police help

Organizers of the Jim Thorpe Earth Day event are hoping to strike a deal with the borough’s police department to avoid the full cost of an extra officer at the event.

Council President Greg Strubinger said the way the borough handles different events is to have the police chief review each one and determine if extra police is required on top of the officers already on duty.

If the scheduled on-duty officers are asked to spend a majority of time at the different events, they can’t respond to calls in other parts of the borough in a timely manner, borough officials said of the reasoning for extra officers.

Likewise, if an officer is on a call somewhere else, borough officials fear the delay it would take to get downtown for response.

It would cost Earth Day organizers $84.29 per hour for the extra officer at the event.

“We’re a nonprofit organization, and our budget is super tight,” said event organizer Shelly Holland. “I’m hoping we can get a nonprofit rate or come to some type of agreement. Everyone involved with this donates their time and talent. We have volunteers running the food stand. I’d hate to see the event go away.”

Police Chief Joe Schatz said he had spoken with Holland, but no determination had been made on how many additional officers would be needed for the event.

“We’re in a trial-and-error year with police coverage for events,” Schatz said. “We just do not want to see what happened with the Fall Foliage festival last year when we had to call in additional officers. If it’s an event in the park with a significant amount of people, I think it would be a good idea to have at least one officer down there for a few peak hours in addition to the regular officer on duty.”

Mayor Mike Sofranko said he has no problem with council fully waiving the fee, but the cost of the extra officer would come up as a budget overrun at the end of the year.

Holland said vendors for the event pay a $30 fee that goes to the borough. With 30 vendors, that amount totals $900. Borough Manager Maureen Sterner said that money goes toward administrative costs for things like issuing the event permits, health inspections for vendors, making sure appropriate tax forms are in order, etc.

In December, the borough did treat the annual Christmas tree lighting differently when it came to the police services contract because it deemed it a community event.

The same thing could happen here, she suggested, as the Earth Day event is geared toward bringing people into the borough to help clean it up.

Event organizers asked if they could look into hiring their own private security guard, but Sterner cautioned that the borough allowed the Jim Thorpe Tourism Agency to do that for the Fall Foliage Festival and it did not end well.

“It was a complete disaster,” Sterner said. “The other firm wasn’t prepared to do the job properly and those event organizers had to pay the police and public service department anyway because of the mess that resulted from it.”

Brad Konstas, who said he helps out with many Jim Thorpe events including Earth Day, questioned whether it brings in enough people to warrant the extra officer,

“I can see the Fall Foliage Festival, but Earth Day gets maybe 1,000 people and I haven’t heard of there being any problems in the past,” Konstas said. “I think if the officers who are already on duty just come down and walk through the park like they normally do, that would be sufficient.”

While nothing has happened in the past, Sofranko said, there is no guarantee the officer’s presence won’t be necessary in the future.

“Everyone says you never need police until you need them,” he said. “Don’t tell me that something can’t happen. We want these events in Jim Thorpe, we want more of them actually. But anyone who attends an event here should feel safe.”

Holland said organizers are willing to give a donation to the police department or even pay for a part-time Jim Thorpe police officer to cover the event, but the cost for a full-time officer is “overbearing.”

Schatz said he would speak to Holland again before the event in the hopes police coverage can be worked out.