Suffolk LIE fray quiet 'til 2017

Three years after the road war in Suffolk County began, there's a prospect of long-term calm. Deputy sheriffs, not highway patrol officers from the Suffolk County Police Department, will continue patrolling the Long Island Expressway and Sunrise Highway for years to come. Though the friction between the two unions isn't likely to go away soon, we can at least welcome a period of relative quiet on this contentious issue. That means whoever takes office as the new county executive in January can focus on more pressing matters.

There won't be any shortage of non-police issues -- from budget cuts to economic development -- competing for the attention of Republican Angie Carpenter or Democrat Steve Bellone. And there will be other police matters: the selection of a new commissioner, for example, as well as dealing with the recommendations of the federal Department of Justice about how to handle hate crimes. Police morale overall could also use a boost. But at least the new county executive won't be forced to choose sides in the sheriffs versus highway patrol question at the start of a new administration. That's for the best.

Back in 2008, County Executive Steve Levy had wanted the state either to assign State Police to patrol these state roads or to pay the county $12 million a year for performing that service. That got nowhere in fiscally challenged Albany. So Levy decided to save money in a way that wouldn't need help from the state. He pulled the highway patrol officers off the two roads and replaced them with deputy sheriffs, who earn smaller salaries.

Though the amount of actual savings is open to dispute, there's no question that patrolling the two roads now costs the county less than it used to. And so far, despite all the verbal jousting, no one has offered compelling evidence that the deputy sheriffs are doing an inferior job.

The Suffolk County Police Benevolent Association took its complaints about the change to the state's Public Employment Relations Board. Last year, an administrative law judge dismissed the charges. Most recently, Levy and the deputy sheriffs' union came to an agreement that the union ratified last week: The deputies will patrol the two major roads until 2017. In return, they agreed to defer payment of half of the retroactive pay increases the union won at arbitration. Instead of getting all $8 million right away, the deputies will postpone $4 million of it until 2015.

That agreement, Levy argues, is very similar to the dollars-for-job-security pact the county reached with the PBA in 2009: The police union agreed to help the county save money, and the county said it wouldn't shift any further police jobs to other agencies until 2015.

There's no question that Levy's decision to take the jobs away from the highway patrol left bruised feelings. Among other things, it drove a wedge between the PBA and Commissioner Richard Dormer, who oversaw implementation of the change. But it did save money.

Now, the agreement with the deputies at least cools down the issue and removes it as a decision the new county executive will have to make. Bellone or Carpenter will have more than enough problems without having to wrestle with this one.