E. Greenwich delays vote on police layoffs

The East Greenwich Township Committee tabled a measure Tuesday night to lay off nearly 30 percent of the township's police officers after the mayor recused himself from voting on the removal of a part-time officer, extending a protracted battle over how to stem the township's budget woes.

Mayor Fred Grant said in an interview before the scheduled vote that a majority of the committee had asked him to place the layoffs on the meeting's agenda, suggesting the committee was likely to vote in favor of them.

But he recused himself from voting to lay off part-time Officer Gerald Hall, who helped arrest him in July on drunken-driving and speeding charges.

That set up a vote along party lines, with two Democrats voting to lay off Hall and two Republicans voting not to do so. As a result, the township solicitor told the committee that it could not consider a vote on full-time officers, who are protected by a union. Under the township's collective bargaining agreement with its police union, part-time officers must be laid off before full-time officers.

Grant's decision marked a reversal: He had sparked a controversy when he removed Hall from the township's annual reappointment list during its reorganization meeting in early January. Grant has said the issue was not related to his arrest.

That caused some members of the committee to vote - unwittingly, they said - to lay off Hall, setting off a political firestorm.

The committee voted in its next meeting to reinstate Hall and a part-time clerk.

Laying off Hall and five full-time officers would have saved about $400,000, Grant said. The township has seen declines in state aid as well as revenue from a decline in construction and slowed growth. As a result of the tabled vote, the township still faces a half-million-dollar budget shortfall. Grant has sought 20 percent across-the-board spending cuts from each municipal department.

A packed crowd of about 150 residents and police officers from East Greenwich and other towns applauded the vote.

"People are asking themselves: 'How did we get into such a situation that we have to lay off this many people at one time?' " said Dave Jenkins, 66, a former committeeman, in an interview.

In an interview before the meeting, Police Chief Barry Jenkins called the scheduled layoffs "unwarranted" and warned they would have dire consequences for residents.

The department has 21 officers. Even with the layoff, Grant said in the interview, the township would still look to slash $100,000 more from the department's budget.

"To put it in perspective, I can lay off all of the employees in the municipal building" and the entire Public Works Department minus three employees, "and that doesn't get me the 20 percent savings needed from the Police Department," he said in the interview.

Every other department has met the 20 percent cut, Grant said.

Negotiations with the Police Department on making the cuts faltered.

"I will not sacrifice officer safety, nor the safety of the residents of East Greenwich, to stay within an unrealistic number set by someone sitting behind a computer using a calculator," Jenkins told the committee in a budget meeting a couple of weeks ago, according to a copy of his speech. "The amount of money that is being suggested we should cut will decimate the Police Department."