Mayor White puts his Chief's new chase policy on hold
Apparently, police union chief Hans Marticiuc and Councilmember Michael Berry weren't the only ones who didn't take kindly to being blindsided by Chief Hurtt's decision last week radically to change HPD's chase policy, without input from Council or the public. As multiple news sources are reporting, Mayor White has put the whole thing on hold. Here is an excerpt from Reggie Aqui's reporting for KHOU-11:
Days after the police chief announced that chasing suspects would be limited, Mayor Bill White on Monday announced that the city needs to take a step back.
HPD Chief Harold Hurtt did not want officers to chase people allegedly involved in minor offenses. That was HPD's policy until Monday morning.
"We have decided to hold the pursuit policy in abeyance until we can get it on the agenda of the public safety subcommittee, and we'll have discussions where we'll allow officers as well as citizens interested, individuals, to have additional comments," Chief Hurtt said.
Mayor White, who said he supports the chief's policy, asked the chief this weekend to suspend that policy.
"I think there was a ... breakdown in a process of reviewing that policy with council members and the union before it was announced," Mayor White said.
The mayor said he fully supports the chief and his autonomy. He also said he believes Chief Hurtt should be able to make his own policy but in this case, he believes the chief should have come to both his office and City Council.
Mayor White can make it sound as nice as he wants, but this amounts to a (needed and welcome) slapdown of his bumbling, handpicked police chief.
Of course, leave it to the Chronicle's Editorial LiveJournalists to come out solidly behind the Chief's now-aborted policy today. Way to be timely and relevant there, guys!
Yesterday, KRIV-26 reporter Isiah Carey posted on his blog that Hurtt and Marticiuc were meeting with their babysitter this weekend. It now seems likely that the babysitter informed the two that Mayor White would now be taking control of the issue, and that they should stop their attacks on each other.
ADDITIONAL COVERAGE: KPRC-2, KTRH-740, Chronicle.
UPDATE: KTRH and KPRC web reports are misquoting Chief Hurtt, who clearly says "interested individuals" and not "arrested individuals" in the video that is posted on the KPRC website.
BLOGVERSATION: Lone Star Times, Isiah Carey's Insite.
Posted by Kevin Whited @ 08/28/06 02:27 PM | Print |
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