Notes from the November 20, 2024 Police Commission Weekly Meeting

• This week's meeting was the last meeting for Commissioner Shelley Freeman.  Commissioner Freeman resigned to devote more time to her work as regional president for Wells Fargo's Los Angeles Metro Community Bank.  Her nominated successor, Robert Saltzman, was present at the meeting this week and is scheduled for confirmation by the City Council on Wednesday, November 21, 2007.  If he is confirmed, his first day with the Commission will be Tuesday, December 4, 2007.
• The Board of Police Commissioners presented Commissioner Freeman with the Police Commission Distinguished Service Medal, the highest award for service the Commission is able to bestow.  An emotional round of tributes from each Commissioner followed.  Commissioner Freeman then thanked the Commissioners and several others, including Chief Bratton, for her experience on the Commission. She characterized her experience with the Commission as life changing.  She listed the achievements of the Commission during the her tenure, including increasing Department transparency, streamlining the Use of Force review process and tremendous progress in Consent Decree compliance, among a long list of others.  She also listed issues she encouraged the Commission to continue to focus on, one of which was the Explorer matter, which was among the meeting's agenda items.
• Sitting in for Chief Bratton, Assistant Chief Sharon Papa reported on the officer who was injured in Hollenbeck Area before the meeting began.  The officer was run over by a suspect and he sustained 2 broken legs.  Further details were still being confirmed.  Assistant Chief Earl Paysinger and Deputy Chief Mark Perez went to the scene of the incident.
• The Inspector General introduced a new employee, Police Performance Auditor III Amanda Dyson. 
• Commissioner Freeman pulled 4 of the meeting's Consent Agenda Items for discussion, as they pertained to the Explorer matter.  All nine of the meeting's Consent Agenda Items were ultimately approved.
• The verbal presentation from the Department, made by Deputy Chief Mark Perez, as requested by the Board on October 23, 2024 on the current status of the personnel investigations and adjudication process relative to the MacArthur Park incident occurring on May 1, 2007, was accepted.  Another update on this matter was requested for the December 18, 2024 weekly meeting.
• The verbal presentation from the Department, made by Commander James Cansler, regarding the Diversity of Police Officer Applicants in the hiring process, was accepted. 
• The Department's report, dated November 8, 2007, relative to a supplemental award agreement of $200,000 for the augmentation and extension to the law enforcement response to Human Trafficking Grant Award, was approved.
• The Department's report, dated November 13, 2007, relative to the wireless data card funding request with detailed specifics on the history of transactions, was approved.
• The Department's report, dated November 9, 2007, relative to the Blake-Justice Consent Decree Annual Report for Fiscal Year 2006-2007, was approved.
• The Department's report, dated November 10, 2007, in response to a Board request, relative to an action plan and quarterly report on the City Controller's audit of Fiscal Operations Division of the Los Angeles Police Department, was approved.
• The Department's report, dated November 2, 2007, relative to a request for proposal for Canine Veterinary Services for the Department's K-9 Platoons: Metropolitan Division, Narcotics Division, Emergency Services Division's Bomb Squad, and Bomb Detection Canine Unit, was approved.
• The Department's report, dated October 31, 2007, relative to the Ethics Enforcement Section Quarterly Report, Third Quarter 2007, in accordance with the Annual Audit Plan, was approved.
• The Department's report, dated November 13, 2007, relative to the Discipline report, Third Quarter 2007, in accordance with the Annual Audit Plan, was approved.
• The Department's reports, dated August 6, 2024 and September 7, 2007, in response to a Board request, relative to the Police Explorer program and administrative issues, was approved.  Another update on the Explorer matter was requested for the December 18, 2024 weekly meeting.
• The Department's report, dated August 8, 2007, relative to the ordinance, policy, and procedures in respect to the acceptance of donations for the Police Department, was continued.  This issue will be on the agenda of the December 18, 2024 weekly meeting.
• The Executive Director's report, dated November 15, 2007, relative to awarding the Police Commission Distinguished Service Medal to Shelley Freeman for her service as a Police Commissioner, was approved.
• The Department's report, dated November 14, 2007, in response to a Board request, relative to an update on the progress of Professional Standards Bureau's Racial Profiling investigations subsequent to the implementation of the new protocol, was approved.  This issue will be revisited in six months' time for an update.
• The Inspector General's report, dated November 16, 2007, in response to a Board request, relative to a review of the Department's use of Professional Standards Bureau's Racial Profiling investigative protocols, was approved.  This issue will be revisited in six months' time for an update.

Comments

[Dan]

Did anyone see the news about the Sheriff cutting crime in Compton, going after fugitives in an aggressive manner, and very few recruiting woes because of the TV show The Academy? I wonder what would happen if the chief would take this approach and maybe take some advice from Sheriff Bacca? Well I guess the aggressive policing is pretty much out of the question and just more smoke and mirrors for the community that lives within the boundaries of Los Angeles.

[El Tecolote]

Yes, I did see a recent episode of "The Academy." It was refreshing to see that there is at least one SO CA Police agency(LASD), that hasn't caved in to the special interest groups and lowered their standards.

Recruits are still deselected if that can't apply the techniques that they are taught and expected to perform in the field after graduation. It is called accountability.

I watched the show where the recruits and staff participated in a "Pride Run" which started and ended at Temple Station. The run was dedicated to Deputy David Marsh who was murdered in the line of duty.

I was very surprised to see LASD command staff participate in the event. Unlike LAPD, the LASD comand staff including Sheriff Baca, appeared to be in tune with the lower ranking PT staff and patrol deputies.

LAPD can celebrate the appointment of the newest member of the LA Police Commission, Robert Satzman. According to Saltzman who is openly gay..."Diversifying the police force is a significant problem, perhaps the most significant problem facing the force."

Oh really? Are you aware that over 50% of LAPD sworn personnel are women and minorities.

How about the fact that LAPD has one of the most archaic and asinine complaint systems in place. 6700 personnel complaints were taken in 2006, 6400 taken in 2005 and 6400 in 2004. Are you going to do anything about that?

How about addressing that LAPD has one of the most restrictive use of force policy's among any LE agency in the U.S.

How about addressing the communications problems in that officers and detectives are issued ineffective hand-held radios, which hamper their ability to communicate.

How about addressing the shortage of sworn personnel in patrol and area detectives.

Dump COMSTAT!

LAPD has lost focus in its mission to reduce crime and the fear of crime.

[b&wop;]

Dear city taxpayers and fellow police officers:

Mr. Robert Saltzman, a lawyer and academic, was appointed to the Police Commission, replacing outgoing commissioner Shelley Freeman, who received the commission's highest award on her last day. What she did to receive that award, which I can't remember ever being bestowed upon a down in the trenches, life risking, always lambasted police officer in this city, I can't recall. But I digress.

My first impression of Mr. Saltzman, and first impressions are powerful, is that he either wears his sexual orientation on his sleeve, thereby allowing it to dictate everything he does in life; or, he talks without engaging the brain into gear first; or, he likes to jump to conclusions without knowing the facts; or, he already has a pre-determined mindset about the LAPD and facts won't get in the way he thinks; or all of the above.

Here is Mr. Saltzman's first quote as a Police Commissioner, as reported on the November 22nd edition of the Daily News:

"Saying officers' lack of diversity is among the most pressing problems facing the LAPD, Robert Saltzman was sworn in Wednesday as the latest police commissioner, seeking to make the department reflect the community.

Saltzman, 53, who was unanimously confirmed by the Los Angeles City Council, will replace an openly gay commissioner, Shelley Freeman, who left to focus on her banking job. She was viewed as a champion of diversity who bluntly pointed out instances of poor management in the Los Angeles Police Department.

Saltzman, a former city ethics commissioner and an associate dean at the University of Southern California Gould School of Law since 1988, is also gay and says he, too, will focus on diversifying the 9,549-officer force.

"Diversifying the police force is a significant problem, perhaps the most significant problem facing the force," he told the council. "I view it as a very long, very difficult process and for me ... one of the most important, if not the most important, issues."

THE most important issue facing the force? Commissioner Saltzman will be surprised indeed. I work with gays and lesbians daily, and their sexual preference is never an "issue" because, as Mr. Saltzman will soon discover, LAPD officers are not black, brown, gay, straight, heretics, pagans, catholics, jews, muslims, or anything but BLUE.

Mr. Saltzman will, in a short time, see that the LAPD is an agency bogged down in millions of other problems that keep it from being productive, efficient, energetic, and trend setting. That problem is being controlled by a city council that is corrupt, doesn't put its money where it's mouth is unless its to serve itself. It is managed by people who only promote those like them, who tell them what they want to hear, who have no experience in making split-second life altering decisions, yet are all-knowing in what the warrior that makes the decision shouda, coulda done instead.

Mr. Saltzman will see that the job of enforcing the law and bringing lawbreakers and those parasites who suck the life out of good, hardworking, honest people to justice is constantly being hindered by re-inventing the wheel type managers and those who support them. The job is also constantly being roadblocked by auditors, an ever-increasing and ever-growing pile of paperwork that means nothing, and with each promotion of captains or above, another new pointless rule to follow .

Office of Operations spills out the rule: CUT DOWN ON OVERTIME. The bureau commanders, shaking in their boots, and not wanting to accept the fact that running police departments without adequate overtime funds is impossible, make threats and issue orders to captains to reign overtime in. But the same bureau commanders create new requirements of certain units that will insure MORE overtime is used.

That, Mr. Saltzman, is a BIG issue in the LAPD. Another is radios that don't work. Another is Valley Communications Divison going silent for several minutes because they lost radio contact with the officers in the field. Luckily, no officers were in foot pursuit or needed help.

I could go on and on, but it's like whistling in the wind.

Mr. Saltzman, welcome to the LAPD. Please do spent lots of time on the "diversity" problem. At least we won't get another silly operations rule to get in our way of doing more and more with.......nothing.

Happy Thanksgiving to all.

I'm thankful for only having 10 more years before retirement.

[Officer On the Beat]

If anyone is listening these comments do represent the very small majority of the police officers working on the street of Los Angeles.

The LAPD says it has close to 10000 police officers in it's ranks, but I ask where are they? They are not in an A car in my division.

Most are inside doing clerical work that should be done by civilian staff or not done at all because most of it is pointless.

I can for cast a huge exodus from the LAPD to less restrictive police organizations that pay more and offer better benefits if things don't change. The LAPD is very restrictive unlike any other police department in California.
The UOF, complaint policy, amount of paper work, lack of consistency from division to division, police order after order, a policy manual that is out dated not updated and way too thick, and the list goes on an on. Please someone do something the LAPD is sinking fast and its taking a lot of smoke and mirrors for the community not to see it.

I challenge the department to take a confidential survey on what officers think and publish it to the media. I challenge command staff to get into an A car once a month ( HA HA that would be the day). I challenge someone high on the ladder to make change that makes sense.

[Dis and Dat]

I agree completely with what btwop said. With all due respect to Mr. Salzman, let's get real here. You need to ride along with an A-car and respond to an "Officer Down" call or go with the chaplain to do a death notification to an officer's family. You want to see the REAL "significant problem" with LAPD??? It is not taking care of those who matters most, and that is, the patrol officers who risk his/her life every single day and night. As for me, let's just say that after serving the Dept for over 20 years, I am now retired. But I still care about the "good guys" who take care of our community. Be safe....and take care of each other (since no one else will).

[Ed O'Shea]

b&wop..... BRAVO!