PAUL VALLAS

 

Paul G. Vallas

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MORE CHICAGO POLICE DEPARTMENT FOLLIES FROM CITY HALL.

Chicago continues to reel from City Hall’s disastrous Chicago Police Department (CPD) reorganization and its ill-conceived public safety strategies. With the historic rise in homicide rates and shootings this can not go on much longer. The latest failed strategy has taken 1,000 valuable officers from Districts and Area teams to create new citywide teams to combat gun crime, looting and rioting according to the Chicago Sun Times. This leaves high crime Districts with less officers on the Police Beat which is the essential component to effective community policing and building trust within the community.

Additionally, other Districts that tend to have less crime are now seeing skyrocketing crime levels with the key factor being the lack of Police Officers. The 16th District has seen a 250% increase in murders and a 78% increase in shootings while downtown has seen a 68% rise in shootings, 100% increase in homicides and 150% increase in burglaries. These and other Districts have lost valuable manpower as a result of the failed re-organization and the new 1,000 manned citywide units.

The City’s budget is short $1.2 billion with potential major cuts to the CPD budget. City Hall is now even proposing cutting the District level Tactical Teams from the CPD budget. These Tactical Teams are direct mission oriented in combatting individual District crime trends and have the ability to geographically go anywhere in their assigned District. Having less Chicago Police Officers is a failed tactic to reduce crime. Removing Officers from already manpowered drained Police Districts is contributing heavily to the catastrophe that City Hall has created with its ill advised CPD re-organization and its ill-conceived crime fighting strategy.

The City budget crisis will necessitate that all City departments and programs be closely examined for efficiencies and savings and that must include the City’s $926 million a year and growing annual property tax diversion to City Halls “Slush Fund”, also known as the Tax Increment Financing Program. The CPD budget needs to support a sound public safety strategy that brings sanity back to the organization and management of the CPD. That can begin by returning to the old organizational structure that had significantly reduced homicide rates, restoring and maintaining Beat Integrity and returning District tactical units and Area support teams. Most importantly the Mayors Office must stop micromanaging the CPD and let the Superintendent and his team do their job without constant City Hall interference and brow beating.

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