Joe Friday, eat your heart out...

It’s not the stuff Dragnet was made of -- somehow Chief Steve Balinski doesn’t strike as Officer Joe Friday. 

But the police reports yield some problems in the land of the big animals.  For example, a resident reported “...that she had an argument with her live in boyfriend and he left and has not returned…”  It’s not the stuff that Stabler and Benson deal with on a regular basis, if at all.

The village does, to my surprise, have its own special unit.  It’s not SVU or SUV, CI, CSI, or NCIS.

It’s the truck enforcement unit.  Really.

I happened to pull up behind the truck enforcement vehicle recently and was amazed – absolute amazed – that the village had such a unit.

Undaunted, I contacted Chief Balinski (who I think resembles Peter Boyle in Young Frankenstein) about the unit.

It’s a big deal.  We’re talking crackdown on overweight trucks, coordination of “between developers, trucking companies and the village.”  Huh?  According to Commander Steve Husak of the BGPD, the purpose here is to make sure there is coordinated “truck routing in and out of commercial job sites.”

Truckers beware... 

Husak also informed me that “This unit issues permits for overweight and oversize vehicles using Village maintained highways. These officers respond to complaints from residents about truck specific problems and they check trucks for safety and driver’s license classification violations”

The unit, Husak noted, also checks for overweight trucks.  How?  The village does not have truck weight checkpoints (like the ones on state road that never seem to be open).  Rest assured Buffalo Grovians; the TEU is equipped with portable scales and will, noted Husak, weigh suspected overweight trucks on site.

So how do you suspect an overweight truck?  It’s probably difficult unless it’s wearing Spandex, which reveals everything (there ought to be a law banning Spandex when someone’s weight exceeds AMA, FDA, CIA standards…but that’s a topic for another day).  Husak noted that the state has specific guidelines for trucks.  In a nutshell, maximum weight for large trucks is 80,000 pounds, which is a combined weight for truck and load.  So if you see a truck that needs an axle tuck, or one that’s avoiding whipped cream with its latte, it may be an indication that it’s fighting the battle of the bulge.

Of course, some trucks can skirt the issue.  Ever see a garbage truck?  Husak agrees.  “garbage trucks in general need to comply with the weight restrictions, which can be difficult for the drivers to manage as they collect refuse along their routes. Wet garbage weighs more than dry.”

So, as Mr. Portokalos: would say, there you go.

What’s needed know is a village wide S.O.S – Save Our Streets.  Residents can do this by drying their garbage.  This can be an easy task by eating only dry food.  Cereal will work fine; I’m not so sure about pasta.  It’s a small thing, but it will help the police department by making life easier for the TEU.

Who knows, before long we may see the CPU on the street, a move that could net the village thousands of dollars.

CPU?  That could be the next version of Law and Order.  “In the war on crime, telephone crimes are considered especially annoying.  In Buffalo Grove, the dedicated professionals who investigate these crimes are member of an elite squad know as the Cell Phone Unit – these are there stories.”