9th District candidate Brad Shore on police staffing, chief search

Ninth District City Council candidate Brad Shore released a statement today calling for maintaining 2008 police staffing levels and giving support to an internal search to replace former Police Chief Anthony Batts. The search firm handling the chief position recently announced it was broadening its search to include outside candidates, which has riled some of the Police Department's rank and file.

One question that I will put to Shore in a future interview will be how exactly he would pay to maintain the police levels. Where else would he cut? Would he try to increase revenue through new fees or taxes? With Long Beach expected to face further budget deficits over the next two years, these are the questions that every council candidate who wants to maintain or increase services will have to answer.

Shore, a therapist and airline employee, is running against Vice Mayor Val Lerch, who is running for a third term on the council as a write-in candidate (his name can't appear on the ballot after serving two full terms); and against Dan Pressburg, a financial consultant and former staff member of Lerch; and Steve Neal, a social worker with strong union support.

Here is Shore's complete statement, verbatim:

One of the major reasons I decided to run for City Council in the 9th District was Public Safety. There is a desperate need to preserve and increase the number of officers on our streets. The cry, "More cops won't help" is wrong. The Long Beach Police Department (LBPD) has proven that rapid response to emergency calls saves lives. I believe LBPD to be one of the finest in the nation and doing a great job with the manpower and resources they are given. That said, we must make a greater investment in support of our dedicated officers and Public Safety.

Three to four people a month lose their life in Long Beach. Three to four people a month are murdered in Long Beach. While several Elected Officials and Senior Management staff in this City continues to say Crime is down, the posted LBPD Crime statistics don't agree. We just closed the year 2009 with 39 murders, 125 forcible rapes, 1257 robberies and 1515 aggravated assault. The year 2008 closed with 40 murders, 120 forcible rapes, 1484 robberies and 1507 aggravated assault.

Added to the year-end data, I learned today of veteran officers leaving due to retirement incentives. Regardless of tough economic times we can not afford to lose veteran officers or any officers for that matter. Our citizens and our police officers deserve better. They need the seasoned veterans and an increase in officers for both their protection and ours. Our Mayor has stated that the number of officers is going down, actually staffing is nearing the early 1990s levels, yet he promised when he ran for office in 2006 to add 100 new officers. So, what's the correct staffing level? I say, pick the year with the lowest crime, duplicate it and stick with it. In our case it happens to be 2008.

In addition, a Police Chief and the replacement of these seasoned officers should be chosen from within the ranks. The internal candidates have proven themselves. It has also been proven in the past that bringing in officers from outside, harms the morale of those who have been dedicated to protecting us; they deserve the promotions for their dedication and seasoned knowledge of our City. We cannot go back to the 1990's where we had to bring in the Sheriffs to protect the Ninth District or any other District. In closing, one murder, one forcible rape, one robbery and/or one aggravated assault in our City is ONE to many.