Friday, October 29, 1999
I-75 patrols drop as grants dry up
BY JANE PRENDERGAST
The Cincinnati Enquirer
Orange barrels, construction zones and lower speed limits still choke Interstate 75 in Northern Kentucky. Next week, however, there could be fewer of one thing — police cruisers.
Starting Monday, only one of six Kenton County police departments that provided extra speed enforcement along I-75 will still do the overtime patrols. The others dropped out of a federal program to pay for the patrols because cities now are expected to match their grants.
“It's just not economically smart for us,” said Mike Ward, Crescent Springs police chief. “We've got to spend our money the best we can to take care of our own streets.”
Leaving the interstate less covered concerns him and many other officers. Common sense tells them people are more likely to drive fast, and therefore make the stretch less safe, if they don't see police cruisers.
But the overtime money, while it covered the officers' time, never really covered all the related costs, such as benefits and extra court time required to testify in the cases.
The pullout also rekindles a years-old debate between local departments and the Kentucky State Police. Locals say maybe troopers should run radar in Northern Kentucky more often; KSP says they're plenty busy elsewhere already.
All Northern Kentucky de partments can still patrol the highway if they choose. But nothing requires them to do so, and chiefs admit they likely won't do it often.
Drivers interviewed this week had mixed reaction to the news. Some were glad to hear they might not be watched as much. Others said they would welcome more police presence, not less. Ongoing construction has narrowed lanes and lowered the speed limit.
“It's crowded out there sometimes,” said Brian Gibson, a Villa Hills man who admitted to attracting some police attention in the past with his red Mustang. “There's debris from the construction, too. It can be kind of a mess.”
Only the Kenton County Police Department sought part of the federal overtime pot for
the current fiscal year. Kenton officers can start tapping into this year's $17,000 overtime grant Monday.Previously, between 1995 and 1998, groups of the smaller departments shared $50,000 a year.
The current grant should cover the highway 10 hours a week for a year.
“It's a drop in the bucket,” Chief Ward said.
He led his city, with Park Hills, Fort Wright, Fort Mitchell and Erlanger, in 1995 to get the first joint grant from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.
They argued that the money was needed particularly to help them make safer the old “Death Hill” spot, the sloping northbound stretch into Covington that got its name from the dozens of wrecks it caused, some fatal.
Officers wrote thousands of citations during the grant years — more than 5,000 by Kenton County Police alone. Yet this year, to get the relatively small grant of $17,000, Kenton County had to kick in another $17,000 of its own money.
Contrary to public perception, Kentucky police departments do not get a cut of the citations they write. Some individual departments in Ohio do.
The grants are part of more than $100 million in federal funds states will divide this fiscal year. Kentucky's cut is $2.8 million.
Ohio's is expected to be larger, but the state's Department of Public Safety won't release the individual grant amounts until Nov. 15 when all are set, said spokeswoman Andrea White.
The Cincinnati Police Division did not ask for any federal money for I-75. It still awaits final word, however, on a $109,000 overtime grant to target Fort Washington Way.
Several other Northern Kentucky departments got money, but for different things, mostly overtime DUI enforcement. Florence got $25,000; Ludlow, $17,000; Fort Thomas, $14,000; Campbell County, $22,000, and Highland Heights, $17,000.
Kentucky and Ohio are two of only a few states that still grant the money for officers' overtime, said Kent Scott of Kentucky's highway safety standards department. Kentucky chooses the method because officials decided it was the best way to spread the dollars around as much as possible.
Others give bigger allotments so departments can hire additional officers. Covington hopes to get a piece of that kind of grant — $166,000 to hire two officers.
Individual states decide whether departments should match the grants or not.
Kentucky departments' requests totaled almost $5 million this year. They can get money without a match for three years, but then have to chip in an extra 33 percent the fourth year and 50 percent every year after.
“There's just not enough to go around,” Mr. Scott said. “We just flat ran out of money.”
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