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Police Chief McDonnell Hopes For Sizable Replenishment Police Academy Class in Oct. 2011 |
(August 8, 2011) -- LBReport.com provides below a transcript of the salient portion of a mid-November 2010 briefing for media outlets held by LB Police Chief Jim McDonnell during which he responded to a question about what he hoped to see in the FY12 budget.
At the November 15, 2010 news briefing, Police Chief Jim McDonnell said LBPD was losing about forty to fifty officers per year due to normal retirements/attrition, and he hopes for a sizable replenishment Police Academy Class in Oct. 2011. "[F]or us to be able to replenish some of those bodies, we need to run an academy. We're looking at options as a lateral academy. There's been some optimism for a lateral academy here because experiences in the past have not always been that positive...The ideal would be to have a full regular recruit academy and my goal is to be able to work with the city departments, and the city manager, to be able to come up with an agreement to start a new police academy October 1 of 2011...but as soon as we can possibly do that which would be October 1, my hope is that we can start gearing up to that over the summer months with what we have in house to be able to get us to a position where we could kick of an academy of considerable size to be able to start looking at replenishing some of those numbers," Chief McDonnell said [extended transcript and background below]. Nov. 15, 2010 One intervening change since Chief McDonnell's Nov. 2010 remarks: fewer officers retired in 2011 than management expected. However, as previously reported by [and seen live and now on-demand on] LBReport.com, on Aug. 2, 2011 Mayor Foster and City Manager West released their proposed a FY12 budget for City Council consideration would fund but doesn't envision conducting a replenishment police academy class in FY12. Mayor Foster and City Management have proposed that the Council let police levels taxpayers decline by expected attrition by 31 sworn officers during FY12 (Oct. 2011-Sept. 2012). LBPD total officers [cited by Chief McDonnell below] include roughly 60 officers contracted/funded by the Port/LGB/LBCC/LBUSD/LB Transit) which aren't available for routine citywide deployment and aren't funded by the Council-budgeted General Fund. Roughly nine months ago during a Nov. 15, 2011 media briefing, Chief McDonnell responded to a question by then-PressTelegram.com reporter Paul Eakins seeking general comments on the status of budget/staffing issues. The Chief replied with specifics, below: Chief McDonnell: ...This year as best we could, we wanted to be good partners with the rest of the city, and we want to continue to do that, but we get at a point now where we're at 867 [sworn officers] in the budget now [884 minus 17 recruits eliminated by not funding FY11 replenishment police academy class, using that money to layoffs of officers currently above budgeted level] and we anticipate losing 40-50 a year sworn officers for general attrition, just people ready to retire. Immediate past Police Chief Anthony Batts had called publicly for increased police levels before leaving to head the Oakland Police Department. LB taxpayers currently receive a budgeted police level for citywide sworn officers (not including Port/LGB/LBCC/LBUSD paid-contracted officers) thinner than when Mayor Beverly O'Neill took office. The LB City Council has balanced several recent spending budgets by "proportional reductions" that don't spare/prioritize police/fire spending...and LB taxpayers currently receive a police level roughly equivalent to Los Angeles cutting LAPD's officer level by over 25%. For several years, the City of Long Beach, with Council majority voted approval, has declined to conduct replenishment police academy classes that would normally replace officers exiting due to retirement or other exits). In recent years, LB's crime levels have dropped citywide, leaving crime concentrated in certain areas. In 2010 -- during which crime (and murders) declined citywide -- over half of LB's murders took place in part of the 1st and 6th Council districts. X's below indicate 2010; O's indicate 2011 murders through July. The 6th and 1st districts collectively accounted for over half of all 2010 Long Beach murders. 1st district Councilman Robert Garcia was chosen by Mayor Foster to chair the Council's Public Safety Committee. 6th district Councilman Dee Andrews recently announced his intention to seek a second Council term of office. The Mayor/Management proposed FY12 budget includes the following:
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