Police union getting word out
Just had a colleague drop off the San Bernardino Police Officers Association newsletter he received in his mailbox.
Interesting stuff. Rich Lawhead, smiling, stands in the cover picture, showing no ill-effects from the vicious battle he waged with City Attorney James F. Penman last week.
In the Sun, both men were quoted ripping each other, with Penman all-but calling Lawhead an extortionist and Lawhead calling Penman a "liar."
But back to the letter. Clearly, the strategy is to portray police as community sentinels while highlighting the big parolee population and corollary crime problems. Obviously, this strategy is neatly in-line with Penman's, and counter to Mayor Pat Morris.
The union uses Penman's parolee population numbers, which contradict those touted by Morris and Police Chief Mike Billdt.
"It boils down to simple mathematics: More criminals, more crime," Lawhead states in the flier. We know where that kind of philosophy is accepted and where it's rejected ... the point here is that the union is still ideologically aligned with Penman, the personal enmity between he and Lawhead notwithstanding. A reconciliation between Penman and the union in time for the election is not implausible.
The union is entering an interesting period, with the dust-up with Penman and the even more shocking endorsement of Joseph Turner. Anyone who has met Turner knows he's an intelligent, driven man. But regardless of his qualifications or intentions, Turner's hi-profile work as an anti-illegal immigration vanguard makes him anethema to huge swaths of the community, particularly the heavily Latino neighborhoods. Turner likes to talk about how many Latino friends and allies he has, but it's very likely that he's the most unpopular public figure among Latinos in the city. No polls, just a reasonable empirical estimation.
Unions and other major institutions typically shy from strident, controversial candidates. In this case, they threw caution to the wind. How that plays out will be interesting to watch.
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Andrew Edwards. E-mail Andrew here.
The first of what are promised to be quarterly publications of the SBPOA "On Our Watch" arrived here today, too. It was disappointing to note "Postage Paid LONG BEACH, Permit 368", but I opened the dual sealing stickers and looked inside anyway.
There was the revamped old "Lady Beware" page from my days as one of the nation's first C.O.P. Block Captains, Area C, Santa Ana PD, decades ago. That was innocuous enough.
In the page’s sidebar was a conspicuous proclamation of the publisher. That led me to: http://jimfreeman.homestead.com/contact.html where I learned the San Bernardino POA is, to quote the glossy’s front page letter of introduction by Sgt. Lawhead, “…working together [ with this Torrance company ] to make a safer, better informed San Bernardino”.
As a staunch life-long supporter of local law enforcement, I would feel remiss were I not to remind: it is the often-touted lack of sufficient tax revenues that circumvent the consistent efforts toward funding public safety departments, such as SBPD. In other words, the source for the very funding clamored for so loudly and long has been voluntarily subjugated to Torrance by the very employees so desirous of increased funding in San Bernardino.
Rather that speculate on the residency of San Bernardino’s finest, I would remind, as I have since learning the important lesson in economics long ago, “Support Your Local Tax Base And You Support Your Local Economy: Spend Locally”.
Decades of close collaboration with law enforcement has imprinted, “10% of the criminals commit 90% of the crimes” on my brain for life. So, let’s walk through page 2. If of those 10%, 70% are returning to prison (Revolving doors, anyone?) and of those 70% “two-thirds are technical violations currently being re-evaluated”, what does that mean to us in San Bernardino?
Let’s start with the 10 out of 100 criminals that commit 90% of the crimes. Let’s keep this simple and say our population is 200,000. Let’s say our parole load of “over 1800” is 2000. That’s 1% of our population being known criminals on parole.
With the universally accepted 10-90 ratio, we have 10% of 2,000, or, 200 known criminals, committing 90% of the crime in San Bernardino.
7 out of 10, or, 140 are re-imprisoned for those ubiquitous “technical violations”. This leaves a seemingly manageable remainder of 60 criminals out, to borrow from Beastie Boys, “robbin’ ‘n’ stealin’” – and worse. Of course, this is in addition to the domestic violence, traffic collision and other calls dispatched around the clock.
People are wont to throw money at a problem to make it go away. We’ve thrown our money, via Measure Z funds and more, at this problem. It hasn’t gone away.
Let’s look at innovative approaches to solving this serious problem. Clearly, continuing as we have been is not the answer. Former Chief Zimmons commissioned an extensive study by an Arizona firm and reintroduced as-yet-not-fully-implemented Beat System. These are a start. We have much more creative thinking to accomplish before our problems’ solutions are discovered.
Finally, the back page lists fallen officers, heroes all, and the $3,000.00 in annual scholarship donations SBPOA provides seniors with a min. 3.0 GPA. How many more scholarships could SBPOA have funded with the money used to pay their Torrance company to publish and bulk mail the thinly veiled PR piece with Sgt. Lawhead displayed no less than 7 times in the 4 glossy pages, either by image or name?
In this election season candidates would do well to take note; the self promotion above that of the rank & file members was blatant and frankly offensive, rivaling that of even the most intent candidate toward “getting the word out” – the word in this instance, apparently, was Sgt. Lawhead.
If, in fact, there are to be subsequent quarterly editions after the elections are over, I would prefer to read a page showcasing our officers, similar to the Sun article published when Lt. Ted Hanson recently became San Bernardino’s first Black to achieve that rank at the SBPD.
In closing, I encourage every reader to visit their local SBPD substation and inquire about attending, or establishing, Neighborhood Watch meetings where you live, work, study or play. As our finest are often heard repeating, it is the public’s assistance that is vital in the success of any crime prevention model.