In an era of dire city and state budget slashing, LA City Controller Laura Chick released a report today that shows how the LAPD could get at least 500 more officers out from behind desks and on to the street by filling those same positions with civilian employees—who, as it turns out, cost an average of $29,000 a year less than sworn officers. Some of the positions include public information officers, front desk and security staff, court liaisons and the like.
This is one of those cases where no one’s been thinking clearly, it seems. Mayor Villaraigosa and Chief Bratton have been, quite rightly, trying to hold on to the money needed to hire additional police officers for our drastically underpoliced city. But they are doing so in the face of budget amputations that will be draconian for other city agencies.
(For instance, unless something changes, it has been reported that with $2 million cut from the city library system, LA’s libraries will be unable to buy any new books. None. At all.)
But, during all this push for cop hiring, there has been a freeze on civilian hiring in the department, meaning that more and more cops are behind more and more desks, which is just dumb, said Chick in press conference today (although I don’t believe she used quite those words.) Chick pointed out that step one needs to be an unfreeze on civilian hires, so that the uniformed men and women can be moved out from behind counters and desks and on to the street—which is where most of them would prefer to be anyway.
“We do not need hundreds of police officers, at a cost of $30,000 a year more than a properly trained civilian, performing administrative functions that do not require carrying a firearm. While Chief Bratton has made major progress in deploying our officers more effectively, this report challenges us to fully engage in smarter 21st Century policing,” said Chick.
UPDATE: The LA Times’ Joel Rubin has taken the time to wade through the finer details of the 200 plus-page report and has a very good rundown here.
Bratton is reportedly down for it. And anyone with any sense should be too. The union has not weighed in yet. But we trust that they will see this correctly. ( Right guys?)
UPDATE: Okay, Tim Sands did release a message that states (I think) that he mostly agrees: with Chick, but it is so cautious and pretzeled that it’s difficult to tell.
This is the second smart report in a row from Chick. (Her gang report, on which there has STILL been no action, was very good and sensible as well.)
GO LAURA!
This woman must be living in a parallel universe where public servants come up with creative and effective solutions to how taxpayers dollars are to be spent for the public good. Shocking behavior.
What happened to Bill Clinton’s 100,000 cops program? Don’t tell me that adequate funding was phony and political and that the money ran out.
The union will feel fine with this proposal as long as the civilian employees belong to the union, which runs counter to the idea of saving money.
Let the city outsource this police resonsibiity to private companies, and outsource the mayor’s office at the same time.
This is one of those cases where no one’s been thinking clearly, it seems. Mayor Villaraigosa and Chief Bratton have been, quite rightly, trying to hold on to the money needed to hire additional police officers for our drastically underpoliced city.
Many cops having been complaining about this very issue
http://www.lapdblog.org/
i.e. the police doing desk work and all the extra Consent Decree paper work .
http://www.lapd.com/article.aspx?&a=3809
http://www.lapd.com/article.aspx?&a=3808
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What happened to the “100,000 Cops” program? Oh, let’s see. Maybe a guy named “George Bush” and a GOP Congress that treated anything promoted by Bill as the work of the Devil.
This has been another in a series of obvious answers to stupid questions!
If Laura Chick keeps this up she’s going to have be considered for Mayor!
rlc, the cops program only hired the cops. It didn’t fund them for the future, and that was because of Bill Clinton, period.
Richard,
Didn’t you know the power of Clinton? In defiance of the Constitution, he is still responsible for the continued funding of programs, despite having been out of office for more than seven years.
Yeah, it’s great to start a federal program and get credit for it, and then create a phase out of the funding so as to dump it on local communities, who either have to come up with more tax money or fire the new hires. The lack of funding happened as arranged by Clinton–not because others didn’t continue it. Anyway, it turned into a big pork project and failed to meet its promises.
And the Rerpublicans who controlled Congress couldn’t do anything to extend the funding. better to spend trillions in Iraq.
I KNEW IT!!! In some way, EVERYTHING according to liberals has to do with Iraq, and it eventually comes out. If Bill Clinton had handled Hussein, then were would be be? Probably doing the same thing, but he just put it off on someone else. Some leadership.
I really wonder what world Woody lives in? When Clinton left office the US was respected in the world, our currency was quite “hard” and folks clamored to buy our bonds. The economy had low inflation and high employment plus real wages were rising for the first time in a decade with the fastest rates at the the bottom. Not that the wealthy were exactly suffering. And there was that surplus that opened pathways for infrastructure repair and Health Care Reform.
And abroad? Yeah, Saddam was around. So what? Was he bothering anyone? Nope? Were the Taliban and Al Queda problems? Yes, now imaging the GOP Congress dealing with them. All we heard was “Wag the DOG”!
Maybe Woody find the current situation fine but he is in a distinct minority. As I said before he has obviously been reading Marquez because all we are getting from him these days is magical thinking. And its pretty bad magic at that!
rlc, things look rosey when you shove real problems down and out of sight and let others deal with them later and when they’re worse. Yeah, as long as Hussein tortured and murdered in private, then why should we care? And, Clinton took over when the economy was rising under Bush-41 and left office with it officially in a recession. Also, I don’t give a flip what others in the world think of us. You and your French buddies never liked the U.S. unless Democrats ran things the way you wanted. Keep your head buried in the sand or up something, because you don’t see the world accurately or in the best interests of our nation.
You mean like Sarkozy who is McCain’s new BFF. Not to mention those (non) lobbyists on the bus who brokered the deal giving AIRBUS that nice fat AF contract to build aerial tankers rather than Boeing – yes, they’ll assemle the parts in Alabama!
Viva Le France!
You mean like Sarkozy who is McCain’s new BFF. Not to mention those (non) lobbyists on the bus who brokered the deal giving AIRBUS that nice fat AF contract to build aerial tankers rather than Boeing – yes, they’ll assemble the parts in Alabama!
Vive Le France!
You mean like Sarkozy who is McCain’s new BFF. Not to mention those (non) lobbyists on the bus who brokered the deal giving AIRBUS that nice fat AF contract to build aerial tankers rather than Boeing – yes, they’ll assemble the parts in Alabama!
Vive Le France!
You mean like Sarkozy who is McCain’s new BFF. Not to mention those (non) lobbyists on the bus who brokered the deal giving AIRBUS that nice fat AF contract to build aerial tankers rather than Boeing – yes, they’ll assemble the parts in Alabama!
Vive Le France!
Yeah, as long as Hussein tortured and murdered in private, then why should we care?
Most of which was done when Ronald Reagan Saddam’s best friend, a fact which you repeatedly ignore and refuse to address.
Your persistent ignoring of history is proof that you are not capable of offering serious credible commentary in any discussion.
rlc, I monitored the Air Force contract. You’re reading liberal blogs for your information rather than knowing the facts. The contract saves taxpayers billions of dollars, and Boeing was not acting above board. I think that it’s good that thousands of new jobs will be created in Mobile, where the planes will be assembled. Boeing would assemble the planes in Seattle, but they were having components made outside of the U.S. There’s not much difference, except the decision made gives us a much better plane at a much lower cost. Why do you want to waste money in the military?
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Randy, your comparison of our position to Iraq during Reaan’s era to today is a joke. Times and intelligence were different. Hey, let’s go back to FDR and see what he was doing.
Here’s a bit of history. Saddam Hussein secretly financed the costs for Democrats to go to Iraq at a time that Bush was seeking Congressional approval for an invasion. US: Saddam Paid for Lawmakers’ Iraq Trip
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I have yet to see you guys address the post and admit that union will kill any plan that doesn’t help the union.
Iraq didn’t exist when FDR was president.
The documents showing the Reagan administration’s complicity with Saddam’s regime including their knowledge of Saddam’s use of chemical weapons have been released under FOIA requests and are available at the National Security Archives. I’ve been trying to link to this in comments for some time now, but it’s not going through.
Those are facts Woody.The Reagan administration let the sales of dual use equipment and supplies go to Saddam. They helped build his military might. Call me names all you wish, you just look silly in the face of the truth.
Iraq did exist in a technical sense when FDR was president, but was occupied by the UK.