ALTAMONT — Two village police officers have found something they like better than a cruiser for patrol.

Melanie Parkes rides a horse and Kenneth LeBel pedals a bike. Both told The Enterprise this week that children and teenagers are hesitant to approach an officer in a car, but are comfortable talking to a cop on a horse or bicycle.

Horse patrol
A few months ago, Officer Parkes, along with Public Safety Commissioner Anthony Salerno and village Mayor James Gaughan, decided that having a "mounted patrol" in Altamont was important.

Parkes, a Troy firefighter, suggested Fairclough, a horse that Troy Officer Sam Carello had used in the city for years. Parkes and Carello also work together on the State Park Police’s mounted unit.

While Carello owns the horse, Fairclough has been stabled at Parkes’s house in Pittstown for seven years, along with a couple of horses and 20-some other animals, including goats, chickens, cats, a rabbit, and a pig.

Parkes has a trailer for Fairclough and she brings him to Altamont when needed; there is no cost to the village, she said. Parkes wanted to be a cop her whole life, she said. A former State Trooper, Parkes began working part-time for Altamont in 2001.

While the 28-year-old horse has experience patrolling the streets of Troy, he is used in Altamont only for community events, Parkes said.

It’s not realistic to expect Parkes to be able to ride Fairclough from one end of the village to the other, as he could patrolling just a few streets in Troy, she said.

Fairclough worked in Altamont for the recent apple festival at the Altamont fairgrounds, on Halloween night, and for the recent Veterans Day parade.
Horses are effective in crowd control, Parkes said. At public events, she said, "Occasionally, there’s people fighting. They see a horse coming at them and they stop."

Fairclough is a cross between a draft horse and a Clydesdale. He is over 17 feet tall and weighs about 1,600 pounds, Parkes said.

Parkes has seen other situations where a crowd of 300 began to get rowdy, but was dispersed by four horses.
"You can’t beat it," she said.
"He was well received," Parkes said of Fairclough’s Altamont debut. At each event, she said, children excitedly surrounded Fairclough.

The horse loved the apple festival, Parkes said, because everyone was feeding him apples.
On Halloween, Parkes said, as masked children filled the streets of Altamont, "Fairclough was a little nervous, but not wacko. He was great with the kids."
At the parade, she said, "He was an absolute angel." He didn’t flinch at loud noises during the memorial service, she said, such as gunshots or the blare of bagpipes.

Police horses go through extensive training and keep at it, Parkes said. She desensitizes Fairclough by lighting firecrackers and flares, shooting guns, and making other loud noises near him, she said.

Fairclough is a calm horse, so it’s easy to train him, Parkes said.

Parkes praised Salerno, who has been commissioner for a few months and who has been making changes in the structure of the department.
"I’m so impressed with the whole idea of the mounted unit being back," she said.

Bike patrol

Officer LeBel suggested patrolling Altamont by bicycle this summer.

With Salerno’s approval, LeBel took a week-long course at the University at Albany to get certified.
"You can’t just get on a bike and go," LeBel said. "You learn tactical stuff, riding maintenance, safety, how to work with kids...."

The Altamont department then purchased a special bicycle, designed to hold police equipment.

LeBel, who also works for the state, has worked part-time for Altamont for two years. He is certified as a weapons instructor and in other areas of police training.

LeBel got into law enforcement because he wanted to work with the community and with children, he said, and he wanted to make a difference.
He usually patrols by bicycle in the summer. Later in his shift, "when kids are off the streets," LeBel patrols by car, he said.

Bicycle patrols are for community policing, LeBel said. He rides through neighborhoods, talking to and bonding with teenagers, and, elsewhere, looking for suspicious activity.

It’s easier to get around on a bicycle, LeBel said, since he can take shortcuts and ride around railroad tracks. He can make sure the school is secure, he said, because vandals wouldn’t hear an officer riding a bike as easily as they would hear a car pull up.

When he has to make an arrest, LeBel said, he calls the station for backup or, if no one is available, he calls the Guilderland Police. He described a recent situation where two people were fighting. He rode up behind them, undetected, and was able to make an arrest, he said.

Like Parkes and Fairclough, the bike patrol is also used for public events, such as the Scottish games and the Irish festival.