Senate Committee Hears Support and Caution on S.255 Windham County Policing Pilot

The Senate Committee on Government Operations heard extensive testimony Feb. 3 on S.255, a bill to authorize a five-year pilot in Windham County for a regional policing governance and funding model administered through a county-level council and funded by assessments on participating municipalities.

Katie Johnson Applin, a selectboard member from Newfane, told the committee Newfane currently pays about $25,000 a year for sheriff-contracted coverage that yields roughly "7 and a half hours of patrolling per week" and animal-control services. "Presence alone is really important," she said, arguing that increased local patrol hours improve response times and residents' sense of security.

Assistant Judge Chuck Barnett and Sheriff Mark Anderson described the pilot as principally about governance and sustainable funding. Barnett said Wyndham County's budget is about $1,000,000 and gave a simple example to illustrate scale: "The current budget of 1,000,000 dollars in Wyndham County would cost you $10 per year for the county budget" on a $100,000 house. He and other witnesses said a regional, pooled model could spread costs and allow more dependable local coverage than ad hoc, town-by-town contracts.

Sheriff Anderson described prior regional experiments — including a multi-town animal-control contract — and said lessons from those efforts informed the policing pilot design, especially the need for clear contracts, communications and an auditable funding mechanism. "This bill is about governance, and then funding it," he told the committee, adding that the council would define service levels and that the county would likely act as a pass-through for assessment collection and payments.

Committee members focused on several potential friction points: whether municipal approval should be via town meeting or the municipal legislative body/selectboard, safeguards for towns that later wish to withdraw, audit and oversight mechanisms, and startup cashflow if taxes are collected on a different schedule than operational expenses.

Retired Senator Jeanette White urged the committee to preserve the pilot's flexibility. "If you start defining what the council can do and can't do ... it no longer is a pilot," she said, urging the committee to avoid over-prescribing council responsibilities so the pilot can surface questions and solutions.

Witnesses said S.255 as drafted would be limited to Windham County and run for five years, with annual reporting back to the legislature. No formal vote was taken; the committee said it will continue work next week and invited stakeholders to help shape technical fixes such as the town-approval mechanism and audit expectations.

Why it matters: Supporting small, remote towns' access to timely policing can affect public safety, local taxes and county governance. The pilot is designed to test whether a regional funding and governance model can increase local coverage without imposing unsustainable costs on small towns.

What’s next: Committee members signaled support for further drafting and a likely series of markup sessions; S.255 will return to the committee for continued consideration.