Hurtt on manpower issues: patrol city desks more vigorously!
Carolyn Campbell of KHOU-11 reports that the Houston Police Department is moving cops from the city beat to the desk beat:
Dozens of Houston police officers are being pulled off the street next week and some say they're being punished for writing too few traffic tickets.
Some officers say they're being punished because they didn't meet a ticket quota.
An officer with a radar gun is probably the last thing you want to see if you're speeding. But writing tickets is one way officers are measured by their supervisors.
Patrol officers are also expected to respond to citizens' calls, make arrests and investigate crimes.
Approximately 30 patrol officers will be taken off the streets on Monday because their supervisors say they're not productive enough.
"We want to ensure that the taxpayers get full value for their dollar," said HPD Lt. Robert Manzo.
The low-performing officers in every sub-station will be reassigned for 20 days to answer non-emergency calls from citizens in the Teleserve Division.
"This was not a decision that was arrived at lightly," said Manzo. "We took great deal of effort to ensure that this process was done as fairly as could possibly have been done."
Teleserve usually is staffed by officers who have been injured or assigned to desk duty.
We share the reservations of Hans Marticiuc:
"We can't afford to lose any more people out of the patrol loop," said Hans Marticiuc, head of the Houston Patrol Officers Union.
To elaborate -- we can't afford to lose any more street manpower because it's already dangerously thin!
Whether the name is Brown or Bradford or Hurtt, HPD seems to suffer from chronic mismanagement.
Other city leaders aren't much help when it comes to public safety either, with their focus on smoking, Tasers, African-American museums, and downtown park boondoggles.
More: Additional coverage from KHOU-11's Carolyn Campbell.
Posted by Kevin Whited @ 10/25/04 09:13 PM | Print |
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