About 20 Franklin Township residents onTuesday nightasked supervisors to take the issue of disbanding the Franklin Township police department off the table.

Several residents spoke up in support of their community police department. Many said that they moved to Franklin Township because the crime rate is low because the community haslocal police and fire departments.Resident JonathanGula asked supervisors why they brought up disbanding the police department in May and didn't make any movement with the decision for four months.Chairman Ron Green said disbanding the police department was only one of the options supervisors were looking at. He said they were also looking at regionalization or combining with another department.Resident David Bradley asked supervisors to take the disbanding issue off the table and touse the talents of the residents in the room who are willing to help.All three supervisors agreed they do not want to disband the police department."We're concerned about rising costs," Green said. "We've discussed merging with another department, but no one wants to do it."Gula said residents won't mind seeing an increase in taxes if the budget is raised to retain the police.Another resident, Frank Tamburri, asked supervisors to keep the local police. He said state police have 22 troopers who patrol 722 square miles."They don't have the personnel," Tamburri said. "We don't mind paying a little more."Resident Tom Rogal asked supervisors if they did a cost analysis."You shouldn't shoot from the hip to find a solution," Rogal said. He said he read the news story in the Times News and wondered if the issue was blown out of proportion or misconstrued, so he came to the meeting to find out for himself.Green said supervisors do have statistics but do not have a total breakdown on the type of calls police answered.Bart Blakeslee said he wondered why supervisors don't do a better job of informing residents of important issues such as the possibility of disbanding the police department. He also wondered why police don't inform residents about what is going on within the township.Francis Kresge, a resident and member of the fire police, said recently there was an accident within the township and a local officer was not on duty. He said it took a state trooper 45 minutes to arrive on the scene."We can't call a wrecker, do any cleanup or move an ambulance until the police arrive," Kresge said. "We don't have any crime here. We never know what happens."One resident said his neighbor's house was broken into in May and jewelry was taken. He saidhis neighborhad forgotten to arm her alarm system. He said a robbery took place at her home a second time, with state police called and that no one arrived for 45 minutes and they were not sure whether the person was still in the house or not.One woman said she moved from Bucks County to Franklin Township because of the low crime rate. She said crime rates will go up without a local department. She said she had vast experience with grant writing and was interested in contributing her talents to assist the township.Green said supervisors wanted to check options.Bradley said supervisors need to operate the township like a business and they should look at statistics and costs.Vice Chairman Paul Kocher said he was concerned about the heavy misuse of overtime.Bradley said if the department had too much overtime then it wasn't being properly managed."You don't shut down a department because it is mismanaged," Bradley said.Questioning turned to why Franklin Township never has any police issues in the newspaper.Green said it was the chief's choice not to make reports, but that supervisors would talk to him about making reports accessible to the press.Bradley said it was simple. "Supervisors are in charge, and if they want reports then they need to advise the police to provide information. You control what happens. It's up to you to make the decisions."Green said while a majority of residents at the meeting were in favor of retaining the police department, he hears comments from those who do not attend meetings on the other side of the issue.Green said the problem was that people do not attend meetings until an issue is raised. He said more residents should attend to hear what is going on.Bradley said if supervisors wanted to know what residents really wanted, they should put the issue about policeon a referendum.Gula said, "Many people don't bother coming to meetings because they think that it doesn't matter what they say because no one listens to them anyway."Bradley said, "When no one comes to a meeting, it means thatthey believe you threeare doing a good job."