Los Angeles Community Policing ... an uphill battle

Los Angeles Community Policing attends many, many meetings and functions on your behalf, including every Police Commission meeting, most Townhall events, many Open Houses, C-PAB meetings and more. We keep ourselves educated about what's going on regarding public safety in Los Angeles

But now need to find a way to inform YOU. There's so much the public needs to understand, and is entitled to know, and no one is doing this job well. Not even us.

At a minimum we feel the Commission meetings themselves should be televised live, and shown repeatedly throughout the week, just as occurs at City Council. Everyone has a huge stake, and an obvious interest, in public safety.

The most recent Police Commission meeting alone had multiple agenda items of importance, yet we're treading water just keeping up with the flow ... and getting virtually no help from "the powers that be."

The Commission Staff seems to be in the same boat, but does release some information in its weekly Commission News Briefing (shown below).

For example, we'd have liked to have written an extensive article on each of the following topics, telling you how the Commissioners, Chief, City officials and Department staff felt about each one. They're presented bare bones here, and in no particular order, but significant debate occurred on almost all of them:

1) Should a "John," as a result of being arrested up for Prostitution, have the car he was driving confiscated for a month as an additional penalty?

2) A discussion of the new DNA crime lab. Is what's being proposed big enough to handle the need? Can some work be farmed out to other outside facilities?

3) Should venues where RAVE parties are held be continued to be allowed to hire off duty, in-uniform, LAPD officers as security? Are the officers turning their heads to illegal activities? What message does this send about LAPD as a whole?

4) The ongoing Foreign Language Audits continue to reveal that in many cases the Department does not respond well to the communities' needs. We have designated officers with language skills, officers that receive extra pay, but most are being deployed poorly or not at all.

5) The homeless population, especially that which is concentrated downtown in "skid row" includes many who have mental illness, drug addiction and other problems, and many are recently released inmates from County Jail. Now LAPD has a pilot plan to deploy teams of specially trained officers. Is it a good one?

6) The report on Gang Injunctions spurred debate over whether or not enough is being done to deter the excessive violence that's occurred recently.

7) The LAPD was given a budget by City Hall that can not meet even the financial requirements of the current number of new officers in the pipeline. The Commission has its hands tied, since the budget for the Department its expected to manage is outside its control.

In addition, there were the comments of the Chief, as he reviewed the crime situation over the last week, and explained some of his plans for how to deal with it.

We'll continue to do the best we can to bring you information on current LAPD / public safety issues, and are seeking help with the writing, reporting and gathering of accurate timely information, and with representation of the community at Department events.

Feel free to contact the Commission by email or at the numbers below to ask to be added to their email list so you can receive the weekly Commission News Briefing directly.

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