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Boat repair allows village to conduct own lake patrols
The Wolverine Lake Village Council has opted to put lake patrol duties back into the hands of the village’s own police department.
Last year, the village contracted with the Oakland County Sheriff’s Department Marine Division, mainly due to an estimated $10,000 cost the village would have had to pony up for a new engine for its marine patrol boat.
Since that time, however, the projected cost to repair the village’s patrol boat has decreased. The boat will not require a new engine and can be repaired at a fraction of the cost, at about $1,500.
“It’s cost-efficient to do it rather than relinquishing it to the sheriff’s department, which did a fine job, but our citizens prefer us to handle it if we can do it,” said Wolverine Lake Police Captain John Ellsworth. “Now we’ll be able to provide the service less expensively ourselves and add a few more hours of coverage, too,” said Village Council President John Magee.
At a work session held on March 23, the Wolverine Lake Water Management Board agreed with the council to reclaim the marine patrol service.
“We concurred with council’s decision,” said Water Board Chairman Cliff Yantz. “Basically it’s a cost factor, but the sheriff’s department did a good job and offered random patrols that (former Police) Chief Joe George said he couldn’t do at that time.”
Now that Ellsworth is in charge of the police department, random lake patrols will be part of monitoring lake activity.
“He said he would set aside a four-hour block to catch people who speed and think no one is out patrolling the lake,” Yantz said. “It helps with overall control.”
“I’ll be doing things a little different than Chief George by utilizing part-time police officers,” Ellsworth said. “The union agreed to give us that ability so we can schedule random patrols, whether it be evenings or mornings. We will have the flexibility now to not pull officers off the road to do it.”
Oakland County would have charged the village $31.18 an hour for marine patrols this year — including boat use and overhead costs — compared to the cost of $17 per hour for a Wolverine Lake police officer’s time to monitor lake activity.
9 Responses to Boat repair allows village to conduct own lake patrols
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CoryP
April 27, 2011 at 4:58 pm
A 4 hour block to catch people speeding after hours / during the no wake hours… For a law which has continuously been beaten down in court and proven unenforceable…… Exact words from Mr Ellsworth himself several years ago when we called on someone in a bass boat running the lake for over an hour with his wife and kid in the boat….. And what did “Mr Perfect Cop” do….. Took over an hour to get off the road and into the Village Police Boat, where he subsequently met the culprit on the DNR boat launch and gave him a “verbal warning”. Yeeep… This is what we’re now getting folks…. All “fluff” and no balls !
up
April 27, 2011 at 6:43 pm
At CoryP you sound like a person who just has an ax to grind. the perosnal attacks on the village police and its officers are getting old.
No AXE
April 28, 2011 at 10:41 am
Nobody has an axe to grind. The officers of Wolverine Lake are OK. They just follow orders from incompetent leadership. Captain Control is the problem not the officers unless you could Ellsworth as an officer and he hasn’t done anything like police work since he got his riduclous promotion to King. Was this Ed’s idea or John’s or just the clerks? Damn stupid if you ask most Wolverine residents.
Wolverine Officers Know the Captain
April 29, 2011 at 8:49 am
Yep Ellsworth will do things different than Chief George. Well just a little bit different.
He won’t spend his on duty time going to the gym, but …… he WILL continue to spend his “on duty time” to collect money from unsuspecting patriots and sock it away for his own travel and promotional expenses. All this money collected while on the Wolverine payroll is done in the name of honor but he has none. Wolverine police officers know this because they have to pick up his slack or be punished. Wolverine taxpayers’ are paying for the promotion of a sham operation and everyone knows it. Yeah Capt Ellsworth is different than Chief George alright.
Captain Random
May 1, 2011 at 4:31 pm
We needed union approved to get “random” patrols to monitor lake activity? That’s odd since Ellsworht is “the Union.” Yes, he get to set his random hours and makes random overtime. We now have the union making radom choices for random patrol on lake activity that is randomly supervised by who? What a mess this has become. Joe is laughing his professional butt off.
We were lucky to get random police work out of Ellsworth before, now that he is Captain Random lets watch this circus.
Rowing Random Down the stream
May 1, 2011 at 7:42 pm
Row Row Row your boat…
Gently down the stream.
Merrily merrilyn Merrily merrily
The Captain drinks Jim Beam!
Row Row Row your boat…
God help Wolverine!
And God help the taxpayers of Wolverine who foot the bill for these stupid Ellsworth decisions.
At least he won’t be screwin with the citizens if he’s on the random boat rides..
Rowing Random Cory
May 2, 2011 at 8:42 pm
Wow… you’re really an idiot
cory p
May 3, 2011 at 1:55 pm
Hey “UP”…..
When I speak, it’s from personal experience and FACT of the decline we’ve sat by and watched since living in the Village since ’88. No axe to grind…. Just grown tired of being screwed over and used as a source of bottless revenue by all these petty and childish people who claim to be “grown professionals”. Actually been a long time friend of both departments well as the past several chiefs in both municipalities and had known Joe George for over 40 years. Not certain how or why, but somewhere along the string of years Joe and John have both become 2 of the biggest cheats and kanivers that I’ve ever had the displeasure to once of know and been associated with. Leaned on both for assistance and even assisted them both in a number of cases over the years and after a few crude and off the cuff comments and actions this past year, he, his department and the entire city council should be ousted by “we the residents” before we get bilked any more than we already have. Sounds more to me like “UP” has an a## to kiss.
Greg
May 28, 2011 at 8:44 am
What is the population density of the lake VS. the surrounding land?
How will the police patrol the area where people actually are when they’re on the lake?
Will these part-time $17.00/hr officers be as inept and poorly trained as the OCSD marine patrol deputies who preceded them?