County wants new Huntington Station police outpost

The day after the latest in a string of shootings in Huntington Station left one man dead and three wounded, county officials called Wednesday for a new police outpost in the area.

The Suffolk County Legislature's Ways and Means Committee 4-1 vote to place a substation came as Suffolk County Executive Steve Levy announced he would hire 150 more police officers and would consider creating a gang registry - measures aimed at a broader attack on violent crime in so-called "hot spots," pockets of crime, throughout the county.

"Ninety percent of the county is seeing a reduction in crime, but we have a few hot spots," said Levy, who listed Huntington Station, North Amityville and North Bellport as a few of these pockets. "It's still important to embellish our efforts to crack down on gangs and the heroin trade," which are "vicious and invoke terror."

A community 'in turmoil'

The committee's vote approved a bill that asks Levy's director of real property acquisition and management, Pam Greene, to place a police substation in Huntington Station.

"This community is in turmoil," said the bill's sponsor, Legis. Jon Cooper (D-Lloyd Harbor). "My constituents are clamoring for this, they're begging for this."

The bill now will go to the full legislature for consideration on Sept. 16. Cooper said he expects it to pass.

Nearly half of the violent crimes in the Second Precinct recently have occurred in Huntington Station.

From 2008 to June 2010, 311 violent crimes were committed in the area, police said, compared with 636 in the precinct, which patrols the Town of Huntington.

Since last year, central Huntington Station has been a flash point for violence as a series of shootings and stabbings - many attributed to gangs like the Latin Kings, among others - outraged and frightened community members. In July, after the wounding of a teen near Jack Abrams School, the Huntington school board cast a split vote to close Abrams.

The school sits in one of three "enforcement zones" designated by Suffolk police in central Huntington Station since the Abrams closure. The department has also added extra patrols and otherwise boosted manpower around the school.

"We're absolutely not getting run out of Huntington Station, and we are aggressively investigating each of these incidents," said Insp. Edward Brady of the Second Precinct. Brady said officers were more effective on patrol than in substations because they were more visible and could respond to emergencies more quickly.

Dan Aug, a Levy spokesman, said the county executive is "already working with the Town of Huntington in having a manned presence at the town's annex." The police department has said it will staff the annex part-time to monitor surveillance cameras and assist patrol officers. There are currently no police substations in the county. A substation on New York Avenue in Huntington Station was closed in 2006.

Cooper said the Huntington Housing Authority is willing to donate space to the county and proposed it be staffed around-the-clock by light-duty officers.

The lone vote against the substation came from Legis. Kate Browning (WF-Shirley), who argued that the only way to reduce crime in the neighborhood is placing more police officers on the streets.

Fewer officers

Levy's hiring proposal comes as county lawmakers have been increasingly critical of the county executive for allowing police ranks to shrink.

The number of Suffolk police - not counting the new class of 70, which does not graduate until year's end - now totals 2,488, down from 2,802 when Levy first took office in 2004. Even with this class and Levy's proposed 150 new officers, the police numbers would still be down because there are 80 retirements forecast next year.

However, Levy aides maintain the number of officers in patrol cars is 1,032, up from 970 when he took over because of moves he's made to put civilians in some police jobs and transferring most highway patrols to deputy sheriffs. "We can't put out on the street what we don't have money to pay for," Levy said.

While Levy said he plans to pay for the new officers largely through the $36-million sale of the county nursing home or the layoff of 500 county workers, legislative counsel George Nolan said that would be illegal. He said a 1997 law bars Levy from putting the sale in his budget unless the lawmakers approves it beforehand.

To comply with the law, Aug said Levy was weighing a nursing home shutdown, along with layoffs, though he has not given up on a sale.