Should the police departments of Ely and neighboring Babbitt merge?
It’s a question worth considering, according to Babbitt Mayor Andrea Zupancich, who appeared before city council members in Ely last night and posed the question.
“I was there just to say ‘are you open to a merger?” Zupancich said Wednesday, about 24 hours after her visit to Ely City Hall.
Ely council members took no formal action Tuesday and did not respond to Zupancich’s query, given past practice of not discussing matters that are part of their “request to appear” portion of the agenda.
Instead, Ely Police Chief Chad Houde will meet with Babbitt officials including Zupancich in a next step to consider whether the idea has merit and will be pursued.
Babbitt is looking for answers in its quest to maintain police coverage in the city located about 15 miles from Ely.
A department that once had five members is now down to two, with former Babbitt chief Troy Bissonette recently coming on board as an officer in Ely.
Zupancich said Babbitt officials are looking to maintain law enforcement coverage in town, and they’ve received a proposal from St. Louis County.
The county would provide four officers who would be stationed in Babbitt, along with some overtime provisions, and Zupancich said the proposal would be “about $100,000 cheaper than what we currently have with five officers.”
Babbitt also fielded a proposal from the East Range Police Department based in Aurora nd Hoyt Lakes, and Zupancich said “their estimate was higher than the sheriff’s but still lower than what our budget was, and for both of them we would be done with police cars, radios, and we wouldn’t have to worry about maintenance.”
But the discussions with East Range also came with questions about why Babbitt wasn’t looking to join with Ely, which prompted Zupancich to go before the council.
“Their board asked why aren’t you asking Ely, and I said we were told they didn’t want to,” said Zupancich.
But Zupancich added the Ely council has never formally addressed the issue, which led to this week’s request.
Any merger would likely take months to negotiate and implement, and questions related to coverage, oversight, management and other issues remain to be resolved.
It remains unclear the extent of Ely’s interest, given the lack of council discussion this week, but Zupancich said Ely officials are coming to Babbitt “to see what we have.”
Zupancich said that Babbitt is one of many small communities challenged by the current law enforcement landscape.
“We want to provide coverage for the town, but there’s a shortage of police officers all over the place," she said. “The pool is smaller... Right now we just want to pen it up to discussion to see if this would work, or if they would even want to consider it.”
