Comments on Advance Indiana™: Public Safety Becoming An Issue In Mayor's Race

Cato- You fail to take into account the amount of...

2011-06-16T08:20:54.522-05:00

Cato-

You fail to take into account the amount of detectives as well as higher ups that do not patrol. I think IMPD only has around 800-900 officers that are actually uniformed patrol. There are also 3 shifts...not 2 like you said.

2011-06-15T20:28:06.277-05:00

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No disagreement regarding verifying and double che...

2011-06-15T17:32:43.091-05:00

No disagreement regarding verifying and double checking Straub. He is quite the snake. However, (10) seems to qualify the Rangers for services not explicitly stated. The question is does this meet the funding requirements. I think it probably does. But, I also do not have the funding agreement in front of me.

Didn't Peterson also play with the manpower numbers when he promised 200 additional officers? In fact, I think the Rangers were used at that time as well to ostensibly boost the numbers.

Politico Monk: If there's one thing we've...

2011-06-15T15:02:48.608-05:00

Politico Monk: If there's one thing we've learned it's to verify everything Frank Straub says.

Now, Park Rangers are NOT police officers on patrol, they are park police. Their DUTIES are spelled out in the ordinance you craftily abbreviated:

The park rangers division shall:

(1)
Provide for the safety and security of all park and recreation facilities, services, and customers of the city department of parks and recreation;

(2)
Manage the park ranger program;

(3)
Manage the park ranger weed & seed program;

(4)
Develop and manage educational safety programs for the department of parks and recreation;

(5)
Develop, manage and execute safety policy and procedures at park and recreation facilities of the department of parks and recreation;

(6)
Implement and manage OSHA standards and monitor compliance in the department of parks and recreation;

(7)
Enforce state statutes, city ordinances and rules of the department of parks and recreation on properties owned by the department of parks and recreation;

(8)
Develop and perform environmental and safety programs for school and civic groups;

(9)
Develop and implement community policing strategies for properties owned by the department of parks and recreation; and

(10)
Perform such other duties and responsibilities as may be assigned by the chief.

Straub appears to be correct on this one. A review...

2011-06-15T14:28:45.127-05:00

Straub appears to be correct on this one. A review of the May 18, 2009 CCC meeting minutes documents his position. Unless it has since been altered.

-----------------------------------------

DIVISION 6. PARK RANGERS

Sec. 279-261. Created; duties and responsibilities.

(a) There is hereby created a branch of the Indianapolis metropolitan police department to be known as the park rangers division, which branch shall be under the direction and command of the chief or his or her designee.

Why are there so many cops? Rather, with so many c...

2011-06-15T14:24:26.701-05:00

Why are there so many cops? Rather, with so many cops, how can there be any crime? There are 342 square miles in Marion County. At 1626 cops, that gives 5 cops per square mile. How can 5 cops, 2 in the morning, 2 in the evening, and one for swing shift, not be able to cover one half of a square mile?

Think about it.

Imagine driving downtown, from North St. to South St., from Meridian to East St., eight hours a day, every day.

That's one of the more dense areas of Indy, but, still, by your second day, certainly by the end of the week, you'd know everyone. Everyone would also know you and how to reach you.

Indy has more than enough cops. It doesn't assign them properly.

It seems this is a major example of mismanagement ...

2011-06-15T12:30:35.368-05:00

It seems this is a major example of mismanagement by Frank Straub. It is not difficult to look at a manning report and see trends in attrition, plan for them, and to have a regular hiring schedule. Instead of hiring police officer as required by the grant, Straub remodeled his suite of offices at great expense, surrounded himself with highly paid cronies never before needed and increased his personal staff exponentially, pulled police to be his "personal assistants". The Straub Staff is a substantially more expensive deviation from what the Public Safety Director's office previously had throughout the history of our city.

Now his priority seems to be creating a kingdom, instead of public safety.

Why doesn't the police department have continuity in the excecutives? Can it be that the executive in charge of making sure grant requirements was removed by Straub's order more than once? It seems like there is regular reporting of Straub ordering a police executive replaced. How can one manage if there is a different executive every 90 days?

Now there is allegations that Straub was reporting Park Rangers as police officers patrolling our city...outrageous! Did he count dog catchers and code enforcement officers who have special police powers as police officers on patrol as well in his report???

-Something is starting to fester. I wonder what would happen if crime stats were audited? Would we find that robberies were recorded as petty thefts? -Were arsons be reported as out of control bonfires? -Were rapes reported as simple assaults? I think there is good cause to wonder what an audit of crime stats would reveal, given facts that have been reported in media.

I think any military officer would recognize the problem with Straub and have replaced his command some time ago if this were the military. I guess the military leadership that Mayor Ballard got elected on set aside in favor of politics & favors.

Ask the DOK-TOR what qualifies as a "police o...

2011-06-15T07:19:36.040-05:00

Ask the DOK-TOR what qualifies as a "police officer."
Then ask the sheriff why his budget, number of merit deputies, and number of vehicles didn't drop to adjust to the over 300 deputies who were CONsolidated into IMPD.