The “West New York Forward” team’s public safety plan calls for more police officers, lights, and security cameras in town, with mayoral hopeful Cosmo Cirillo also in support of reimplementing a police director.
By John Heinis/Hudson County View
“Public safety is the basis of any successful community. Angelica [Jimenez] and Hiram [Gonzalez] have family members that are police officers, and we want the WNYPD to know we have their back,” Cirillo, a two-term public affairs commissioner, said in a statement.
“We also want to empower residents to feel confident that they are safe when walking the streets of West New York, day or night. Through our public safety plan, we will see to it that they will.”
Their proposal includes redistributing funds to hire more officers and upgrade their resources and facilities. When more officers join the force, they also want to implement walking and bicycle patrols throughout town.
Additionally, WNY Forward is calling for a new police substation to operate as a satellite police facility, with the primary goals being to establish neighborhood relations and gathering information to address community issues.
The West New York Police Department hasn’t had a formal department head since retired Police Capt. Mark Flores retired as public safety director in January 2020.
Following his departure, Deputy Chiefs Santiago Cabrera and Alejandro DeRojas ran the department together – the former had been in charge of administration, while the latter had been tasked with running operations – until DeRojas retired in mid-January.
The last police director in West New York was Bob Antolos, who now runs security for the public schools and left his police gig after shortly Flores was hired in the summer of 2019.
Casey Abline, a spokeswoman for WNY Forward, confirmed that Cirillo would support the reimplementation of a police director during his tenure as mayor.
The non-partisan West New York municipal elections are on May 9th, with the “Sires Team for West New York” heading by former Congressman, Assembly Speaker, and Mayor Albio Sires vying for the five board of commissioner seats up for grabs.
TURK 182
Why don’t cosmo just get the Police to Police. That Dept is ruined by enept superiors.
Time to clean house. Overnight shift needs a few LT’s and a Capt on the streets and also Officers to do the Job willing to do Policing.. Leadership is not there in WNY PD.
Hope Albio shakes things up.