Three residents of Hancock will help the town decide whether to consolidate its police force with neighboring communities.
Michael Cass, Ed Kokowski and Stephen DiCicco were appointed to the Police Regionalization Committee at Monday’s Select Board meeting. The town is weighing the prospect of joining Greenfield and Bennington to form a regional police department to serve all three towns in light of the increasing challenge that smaller towns have in attracting and retaining police officers. Local law enforcement officials have said that among the reasons for this challenge is the higher pay offered in larger municipalities.
The town is also anticipating that Greenfield will join Hancock as part of the Monadnock Prosecution Group, a group of towns that share a prosecutor for criminal matters that rise to that level.
“We hope to have Jaffrey on board as well, but they know they’ll have to bring another prosecutor with them,” said Hancock Police Chief Tom Horne, explaining that Jaffrey has a higher volume of incidents.
The current group consists of Dublin, Fitzwilliam, Hancock and Fitzwilliam. Although they are spread across Cheshire and Hillsborough counties, the prosecutions are handled in the District Court in Jaffrey.
“There’s a consistency of prosecutions across towns. Some offenders have cases in multiple towns,” said Horne.
In another matter, the board announced acceptance of a grant of $9,384 from the Recreational Trails Program of the Department of Natural and Cultural Resources to develop a rail trail in town.
“The Conservation Commission is doing trail work on a portion of the rail trail between Cavender Road and Forest Road,” Town Administrator Jonathan Coyne stated Wednesday.