The borough will pay more than $745K in the first year of a six-year shared service agreement that replaces a seven-year deal officials say undervalued actual police department costs.
Published: Feb. 02, 2026, 3:59 p.m.West Cape May will pay 33% more for police coverage from neighboring Cape May after both towns approved a new agreement to continue their decades‑long partnership. Commissioners in both municipalities last month approved a six-year shared service agreement.
The new contract follows a seven-year deal that expired recently. Negotiations with Cape May began last summer, West Cape May Mayor George Dick said. The borough also consulted with Lower Township and the New Jersey State Police to explore cheaper alternatives. Dick described the contract with Cape May as “fair” despite the cost increase, saying the higher price more accurately reflects the expenses their neighboring police department incurs for providing the service. “The contract that we’ve had in the last set for the last seven years - we probably were underpaying,” Dick said at the commissioners’ Jan. 28 meeting. “ costs were much higher than what the contract showed, so that was a fixed number. They escalated every year by 2%, which wasn’t enough to cover it.” Last year, West Cape May paid Cape May about $558,000 for police coverage, according to the city’s last adopted budget reviewed by NJ Advance Media. A new deal also approved in January extended the city’s coverage to Cape May Point, though not with a substantial price increase, Dietrich said. Cape May Police Chief Dekon Fashaw said the agreement continues the department’s roughly 20‑year partnership with West Cape May, a town of about 1,000 residents.force on Lafayette and St. John streets. Meanwhile, Cape May police officers will work out of a substation in West Cape May, through a lease extended an additional two years, officials said. Through the deal, Cape May will pause a fee levied against West Cape May for county dispatch services for two years while the borough’s substation is in use. In the agreement’s first year, West Cape May will pay Cape May $745,389, a figure based on the total cost to manage the police department. Dick told West Cape May officials the number represents about 15% of the department’s annual budget. The deal does not require West Cape May to contribute to the new station’s cost, Cape May officials said. “There was no real formula, so to speak,” Cape May Manager Paul Dietrich said in a phone call with NJ Advance Media on Monday. “It just always had been what it was, and they kind of increased it over the years based on a percentage that they felt would be acceptable. Over time, it got askew from actual expenditures.”Eric Conklin is an award-winning journalist who joined NJ Advance Media in 2023 from The Press of Atlantic City. He began his journalism career as a college student freelancing for Shore Local News Magazine in...
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