TO PROTECT & SERVE - BUT WHO?

ASMALL DECAL on the black-and-white police cruisers in Audubon, N.J., represents a bold, new era in which communities break down invisible barriers, share assets and start to think like a region.

The decals announce that police in the Camden County borough also proudly serve their small neighbor, Audubon Park, thanks to a shared-policing agreement that the two municipalities made in 2004.

But Audubon police will have to take those decals off soon.

"We were trailblazers," said Audubon Police Chief Thomas Tassi of the merger between the departments, which will end in September because Haddon Township offered to serve Audobon Park for less money. "It's amazing the thing didn't work out."

Shared-service agreements usually have worked out in New Jersey. Municipalities share insurance, recycling centers, ambulance service, municipal courts and judges, and just about anything else that might be cheaper for each if pursued together.

The concept, heavily touted and sometimes funded with grants from Trenton, was generally accepted without any fuss by residents in many of New Jersey's 566 municipalities.

"The concept of regional and shared services is a good concept," said Joseph Doria, commissioner of New Jersey's Division of Community Affairs. "Policing is one of the more difficult aspects, probably the most difficult."

Mentioning the merger, consolidation or flat-out closure of police and fire departments usually hit the same nerve in every town, and it runs beyond sheer dollars into the intangibles of tradition, civic pride and a sense of personal, small-town safety.

"It's the third rail of politics," said Gerald White, deputy county administrator of Gloucester County. "You don't mess with it."

In Medford Lakes, a small Burlington County community of log cabins and snaking trails surrounded by Medford Township, an effort is under way to recall Mayor Paul Weiss for suggesting shared police service with its neighbor.

Former Mayor David Wasson, among the leaders of the recall, says that merging Medford Lakes police would be the first step toward merging the borough itself.

"If we did lose our police force, in my opinion, I think the town is going to go quickly after that," he said.

Gloucester County has had one police merger - between Westville and National Park - and others in the works without hitches, White says.

Audubon hit a snag in March when Haddon Township offered to police Audubon Park for $20,000 less per year, said Tassi, the Audobon police chief.

"Everyone involved basically indicated that the service was outstanding, but $20,000 undercuts you," he said. "It was too easy for them to walk away from."

Tassi said that Audubon Park did give them a reference, however - to nearby Woodlynne, a town also undergoing its own police-merger controversy.

In July 2006, Woodlynne entered into a policing agreement with neighboring Collingswood to hire half of its officers and take over patrols in the small community.

Last month, Collingswood Mayor James Maley announced that he would have to lay off six officers and the contract with Woodlynne, claiming that the increased volume and intensity of calls to Woodlynne had become a drain on his own resources.

Woodlynne Mayor Jeraldo Fuentes was left with the possibility of having no police force.

"I was shocked," he said.

Fuentes went out shopping for police departments, contacting Audubon, Oaklyn and Haddon Township, until last week when a deal was worked out with Collingswood to finish out its contract with a restructured department.

"They realize they are obligated," he said.

Regardless, Fuentes says that a long-term policing relationship with Collingswood is unlikely, and both he and Maley say that shared police services needs more planning.

"It makes for great speeches," Maley said.

Maley thinks that the solution for police is to go large or don't do it at all: He believes a countywide police force could be efficient, yet understandably controversial in the public eye.

"It's the only way this thing will work," he said.

If there's a subject as controversial as police service, it's the dozens of splintered fire departments and the uneasy tensions and rivalries between paid and volunteer members, and even stations in the same town.

Karen Black, a principal with the Media-based firm May 8 Consulting, said that the number of small fire departments in the Philadelphia region is a "remarkable duplication of efforts."

"I have three fire departments within two miles of me," she said. "When the shared-services discussion has been had in Pennsylvania, the townships have become extraordinarily averse to it. The argument is always that my fire department, my police, and my school will take care of me."

Lindenwold Mayor Frank DeLucca, also the borough's fire-safety officer, said that there's not much of a future for small, all-volunteer fire departments as efforts are made to regionalize the fire service.

"Fire departments have evolved so that it's no longer a hobby. You're dealing with people's lives and it's not hit-or-miss. You wouldn't want hobby doctors," he said.

If regional police and fire departments are the way of the future, officials agree, the state must regulate the process better.

"We're not selling widgets here; we're doing policing," Maley said.

Lisa Ryan, a spokeswoman for the DCA, said that police mergers between municipalities are local issues and the DCA normally would not oversee mergers or monitor their performance.

"They should add some stability, because there is none," said Brian Cranmer, president of FOP Local 76 in Camden County. "Right now, with these shared-service agreements, we're mercenaries, we're guns for hire, and it's not right."