May 15, 2002 3 min read

Which would you prefer: a cop on the street or one tied to a phone? Unless you’re of the criminal persuasion, the question is a no-brainer. But when it comes to closing local police stations in order to ensure uniforms on the beat, there naturally arises a sense of regret.

The Connellsville Police Department recently joined the growing ranks of local departments unable to keep its doors open 24 hours a day. In one sense Connellsville was lucky in that it was able to keep its doors open around the clock for so long. Part of the reason is that it had a longstanding arrangement with the city fire department, where firefighters pitched in for a few hours duty a day answering phones, dispatching local calls. And going back several years, the ambulance service pulled dispatching duties as well.

But once Fayette County’s 911 emergency dispatch service went on line the need for local police, fire and ambulance dispatching was obsolete. Uniontown, without the same type of arrangement as Connellsville, soon realized that spending money on dispatchers who were now serving more the role of city directory assistance wasn’t a luxury it could afford.

Connellsville put off the move because of the arrangement with the fire department, but it wasn’t a deal that was of any benefit to firefighters whose skills could be better used elsewhere than telling callers the time of a holiday parade. With the fire department’s exodus from the city station, police chief Stephen Cooper had the choice of leaving a uniformed officer at the station at all times to answer such questions or have limited hours that the station is open to the public. Cooper in announcing the station will no longer be open all hours of the day and night made the right call.

As Uniontown found out there will be a few, isolated times when this decision will be regretted. When a woman, afraid that she is being followed, won’t have the option of pulling into a lit and welcoming police station at 1 o’clock in the morning. But today, with most people traveling with cell phones, the need for stopping at the station to summon help has just about disappeared. There is comfort in knowing the lights are always on at the local police station, but comfort can also be found in knowing an officer is always ready to respond rather than tied to a phone waiting for relief before responding.

relieve him before he can respond.