Reinert As a journalist, I’ve sat at thousands of meetings of mayors and council, county boards of freeholders, state official boards, and dozens of other public boards and committees from harbor commission to sewerage authorities, from library boards to historical societies. I’ve seen outright fist fights at public meetings, calls to the police department of threats to kill, drunks thrown out of meetings, a woman having a stroke at a meeting, and even fights among elected officials that called for an end to a meeting. My own life has been threatened by my honest and truthful accounts of these meetings.
But never have I been so shocked as I was at this week’s meeting of the Atlantic Highlands Mayor and Council when people came out to question the efficiency, effectiveness and wisdom of the Atlantic Highlands Police Department.
Don’t any of these people know this department?
Don’t any of these people know the integrity, wisdom and outright ability to size up a situation and act accordingly of this police chief?
Are they all new to town?
Have they never called on the police department for help, or just to ask a question?
Haven’t they ever seen these police on the street, stopping to talk with a youngster or reminding a teen he needs to wear a helmet?
Don’t any of these people know these cops have kids of their own, many in the local school system?
My concern is, not so much with the fear these parents apparently have over the sight of one apparently harmless and unarmed man on a public sidewalk with a sign that expressed one man’s opinion. My concern is that these people don’t know the excellence of the Atlantic Highlands Police Department.
There were people at this week’s council meeting who perhaps have never been at a borough council meeting before.
There were people who perhaps have been long time residents of the borough and may have had other interactions with the police in the past.
There were certainly some who indeed must be new to the town and do not know the excellence of what the men in blue in this borough are like.
There may have been people in that council meeting room who came from towns where police are more standoffish, nor towing the line, sticking to the absolute rule. Maybe they can be forgiven for not knowing what an Atlantic Highlands police officer is like.
Yet they all turned out, this group of mothers who expressed terror and shock and fear, who said they were appalled, unable to explain to their children the horror of the scene, who said the world has indeed become a dark place, all because they saw a lone man with a lone sign they did not like standing on the main street in town, a county road, near a school where every kid knows he can trust a cop, can talk to them, heck, even had a cop in his classroom or meeting him at the library to read him a story or teach how to call a police officer if he’s afraid.
As a writer, I do see a lot of police action, do get to hear a lot of stories, do get to interact with officers and their records. I’ve been threatened more times than I can count for some of the stories I have written about police on and off the job. I’ve seen good cops turn bad, and I’ve seen bad cops who have been forced to leave departments.
But not in Atlantic Highlands.
I’ve known every police chief in this borough from the days of the great Chief Jim Egidio, and Sam Guzzi, the police chief who spent the rest of his life tracking down a murderer until he was finally convicted of the murderer of a local teenager.
I’ve covered the tenures of the incredible Jerry Vasto, the unforgettable Charlies Mazzarella, even the current chief’s predecessor David Rossbach. And when Current Chief Scott Reinert came into the position, it was with class, integrity, dedication, and a background that proved he is an outstanding chief strong enough to take on great battles, yet soft enough to sit with a youngster and wipe away a tear over a lost dog.
To have these dozens of people vent at a council meeting, and be encouraged by the mayor to speak out more and be heard in their shock and horror was nothing short of simply not knowing anything about the Atlantic Highlands Police Department and its chief.
Cheers to Chief Reinert for speaking up at the end of the meeting. Cheers to the Chief who calmly, but clearly, outlined exactly what his department knew, what they did, and how very protected all the people in this borough were from the dangers of a single man carrying a single sign ion the sidewalk of a county road that runs through the middle of town.
Even in this instance, when dozens of people were challenging the wisdom and work of the department and expressing fear and questioning their attendance to duty, this Chief stood up, explained everything he had done, told everything of which his department was aware, cited his conversation with the single man with a single sign, exercising his First Amendment Right, standing on the sidewalk of a county road in the middle of town, and calmly assured these parents and others that yes, in Atlantic Highlands, under his leadership, this is truly a Police Department that knows and does it job.
Whether the people know it, or appreciate it, or even recognize is, aren’t the important thing even now. What they really need to know is Chief Reinert and the Atlantic Highlands Police Department always have, and will continue, to keep this borough safe.
Even if there are people who are scared silly by a single man carrying a single sign and standing on the sidewalk of a county street in daylight in the middle of town.
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