CARMEL – More and more people are buying and selling merchandise on the Internet. One local community is doing what a growing number across the country are doing – creating a safe area for face-to-face transactions.
Carmel officials expressed concern regarding issues of safety for residents when ‘seller meets buyer’ and have unveiled a pair of parking spaces outside the Carmel Police Station and Carmel Town Hall in Mahopac where those swapping or making purchases can do so in a safe environment.
Supervisor Kenneth Schmitt credited Councilman Mike Barile for initiating the idea. “Now with the parking lot at town hall always under video surveillance, residents can feel safe when purchasing or exchanging merchandise bought or sold on the Internet,” said Schmitt. “Too many stories are being reported regionally and nationally about individuals being ripped off, robbed or even killed when they met someone following an online purchase.”
Barile said while he never heard of such a crime being committed in Putnam, the “area is changing and little old Putnam County is not the community it was 50 years ago.”
