Scott Henson’s ‘Grits for Breakfast’ suggested it may be time to reduce the number of cos in light of falling crime rates. Here is his snippet from Thursday’s GFB:
Justifying more police in an era of declining crime
Recently, the Washington Post pointed out that, despite crime plummeting in the last three decades, the number of police has not declined, wondering aloud, as if for the first time, whether they should. So it’s in that context that Grits reads the Houston Chronicle headline, “As crime drops, police chief says HPD needs thousands more on the force.” This is preventive excuse making. If crime goes down, Chief Acevedo will surely take credit. But if it goes up, he will say it’s because he didn’t get his officers, even though the number of index-crimes-per-officer is near its 30-year nadir.
Let’s get real. The police can do little about reducing crime other than catching crooks and making sure they are kept locked up. A criminal in jail is one less criminal on the streets.
By having a heavy patrol presence in high crime areas, the police may be able to reduce burglaries and gangbanger shootings somewhat. Most other crime, especially assaults and murders not related to gangs, cannot really be prevented by the police.
‘Broken Windows’ and stop-and-frisk operations by the police in New York did reduce crime, but because those operations impacted minority communities disproportionately, they are now verboten.
So the crime rate is going to go up and down regardless of a police presence.
And Scott is right about Acevedo ….. If the crime rate goes down he’ll brag about what a wonderful job HPD is doing and if it goes up he’ll say it’s because he doesn’t have enough cops.
Having said that though, Acevedo is right about needing more cops. With a growing population and countless requests for police services, HPD does not have enough cops to answer even some reported felonies. Asking for 1,000 more cops is not unreasonable for the city of Houston.
The bottom line is that crime rates should not determine the number of cops on the force! The ability to respond to all calls in a timely manner should determine Houston’s or any other city’s police manpower needs.
mark carrell says
Politics determines the amount of police officers more than crime rates. What we have is an abundance of different departments that makes accountability hard to determine. Through the years many new departments with large administration cost and oversight has evolved and people are made to believe that this will make them safe.
Jeff Larson says
This is something you can attack with numbers to get a better handle on it. How many calls does each officer run per day? How much time is spent in transport responding to calls? etc.
There’s a local officer who probably read this blog who ran for Constable a few years ago. Unlike most constable candidates, he was remarkably astute and had a great head for the relevant figures. He quickly spewed statistics on several of the local police departments, describing how their internal culture created those numbers, and why different departments had different numbers.
He rattled off a shockingly low number for HPD compared to some other departments in the area, and followed it with: “Then you’ve got HPD, who has an institutionalized culture of laziness.”
So a few years back, I did a ride along with two HPD officers, on different shifts. Of course, when a citizen does a ride along, they don’t don’t send him out with a lazy officer. They send him out with a real go-getter who shows the department in a good light. I was really struck by the bureaucracy those two guys had to put up with. It seemed really unnecessary on top of what they were doing.
Unless…if an officer was far more lazy than either of those two, making enough “points” by the end of the shift would be just motivation enough to get off one’s butt and actually do some policing. Then it all made sense…the rules were there to ensure that the “lazy culture” actually did some work.
PeterD says
It’s all a numbers game, each vested interest cherry picking their own statistics to suit their needs. Of course the union wants more officers, that means more union dues and their officers are safer when they get to ride two in a squad car. The chief wants more officers because he is paid in part based on how large his organization is, he is currently among the best paid police executives in the country despite his troops being on the low end of the pay scale for a large city force. Politicians almost always want more public safety personnel because that garners votes even if increases in staff become ticking time bombs for city finances.
Even with all the pension changes, the cost of a police officer in Houston is over $100,000 per year. Many of them are worth every penny and then some aren’t worth half that number too. A contract hire of mine pointed out that only half their force answers calls for help, the other half divided among administrative tasks and investigations. News headlines of recent years indicate that every year, city police refuse to investigate tens of thousands of cases, this not including their police chief refusing to let them help with illegal immigration officials. Ask the police chief how many crimes go unsolved every year and the numbers are astoundingly bad, not from a lack of manpower but a lack of motivation. And every time he speaks in front of the media cameras advocating gun control, sanctuary city policies, and the occasional announcement of a crime initiative that had no real impact but used imaginary numbers, I can’t help but remember he was imported from the people’s republic of southern California via Austin.
Not to sound callous but I think we’d all be better off expecting the police chief first change the priorities of his existing officers and restructure his organization before we spend another hundred million or more a year the city just doesn’t have to be told our priorities are not the priorities of the Houston Police Department. Get rid of the illegals, leave our Second Amendment rights alone, and cut all the unnecessary administrative positions as a start.
Howie Katz says
Peter, I agree with much of what you said. There are way too many HPD cops stuck in administrative tasks which civilian employees should be doing. As far as the officers doing investigations, that’s a necessary and vital task.
However, when all is said and done, let me repeat that the ability to respond to all calls in a timely manner should determine Houston’s or any other city’s police manpower needs.
PeterD says
Howie, I asked and was told they laid off many hundreds of civilian employees under former mayor Parker as an austerity measure. Instead of them changing policies to compensate, they simply placed certified officers in the same positions at over three times the expense. The manpower survey the city commissioned not long ago supports the conclusions they were likely told to arrive at, the number of officers needed was guided by existing city policies rather than using a best practices approach to change policies to reduce the number needed in various areas, part of which included a hands off approach on divisions used as dumping grounds for officers deemed unworthy of dealing with the public. The closer one looks at the details, the more sacred cows you come across that a thorough audit would eliminate, all kept at great expense. Fat Albert raises one point that goes a magnitude or two higher than these concerns too.
Fat Albert says
If we’re going to discuss reducing the number of cops, why not start with reducing the number of local law enforcement agencies with overlapping jurisdictions? Do we really need HPD and the County Sheriff and the Constables, and Metro, and each of the local colleges and each of the local school districts – just to name a few? Each one with their own built in bureaucracy and overhead. It’s ridiculous!
PeterD says
Albert, I’d settle for folding the constable offices into the sheriff department but was told by every commissioner I asked that it would never happen. A sample survey of mayors in the county including Katy, Beaumont, Bellaire, and a few from the villages off the Katy freeway indicated they had zero interest in consolidation too, I didn’t even bother with Houston since I knew what that answer would be.
Houston’s deal with the county to provide all jail services is promising, if only the city would use the county crime lab and consolidate dispatch services as a starting point, many millions could be saved. At the rate Houston is going, it might wish it joined forces since it has lost more people than it can train each of the last few years, the quality of what it can now attract is diminishing as well. Once upon a time, that designation was reserved for the constable offices and it’s not something to be proud of. And I’m with Jim in thinking all outside employment tied to police authority should be through their employer in an on duty status. The same should hold true for HOA’s, clubs, and water districts.
Howie Katz says
Peter, all your comments are spot on. Many of those administrative positions are held by officers no longer physically able to do street duty, but not eligible to retire yet. That’s because the state does not have a good disability retirement program like California does. And Parker getting rid of the civilian employees was a monumental mistake.
I used to b eon the Houston-Galveston Area Council law enforcement committee. I once suggested getting rid of the constables and I thought they were going to tar and feather me and ride me out of town on a rail. The constables are a powerful political force in Texas.
As for Fat, he’s got a good point but doesn’t go far enough. What we really need is to have only one regional law enforcement agency for all of Harris County. There are many successful regional law enforcement agencies in Virginia, Maryland, Florida, Tennessee and Clark County (Las Vegas), Nevada, just to give a few examples. But hell would freeze over before cities within Harris County would ever give up their little police departments. I believe there are more than 70 law enforcement agencies operating within Harris County. That number includes local, state and federal police agencies.
Fat Albert says
Howie, you’re exactly right! I don’t have the background in law enforcement that you do, but I can see the ridiculous inefficiency in having multiple agencies which perform the same function in the same area.
I realize that each of these independent agencies has their own constituency and there are powerful political patrons which are often attached, which is why it’ll probably never happen. But it’s nice to dream about political leaders who are actually more interested in the needs of the taxpayers than building their own careers.
PeterD says
Howie, I’ve been told that HPD’s disability program is just fine, the bulk of officers serving in administrative positions are either less senior troops or those who seek to study for promotional exams. Any officer permanently disabled gets a full pension regardless of time served, a Google search leading me to enough supporting confirmation that I don’t feel this is an issue locally. The penny wise and pound foolish use of such personnel for these tasks is as much a problem as duplicating the need for their own press staff, clearly there are enough Darian Ward types out there that cutting these spots would save good money.
Part of the reluctance of the local leaders to give up direct control of public safety personnel was attributed to the belief that Houston would come to control the resulting force. At the time, I pointed out that many area police leaders already had ties to HPD, Mayor Isbell had a retired commander from their force, Harris County elected two former HPD officers as sheriff, and many of the constables were from HPD. Several mentioned how Houston controlled Metro projects for decades based on their size and apportioned control, the city even stealing $50 million a year from Metro to fund their own projects at the expense of the rest of us so they were quick to point out the history. As bad as HPD had been in defying state laws before, who in their right mind wants their current chief in charge of anything? I can’t fault their concern given the sanctuary status Houston is known for.
And if we could get rid of the RINOs on Harris County Commissioner’s court maybe it’d be easier to bring all of Harris County in line by folding the constable offices into the HCSO. Do they all need their own evidence rooms, dispatchers, and other duplicate services? It just makes no sense from a conservative standpoint.
Howie Katz says
Peter, the California system is a lot different.. Officers are forced to retire if it is determined they have a physical disability of 50 percent or higher. Let’s say an officer has a heart attack and is determined to be 50 percent disabled as a result. He will be forced to retire and will receive 50 percent of his pay for the rest of his life. (California considers heart attacks as work related for cops and firefighters.) If an officer is shot and recovers, but is considered 60 percent disabled he is forced to retire and receive 60 percent of his pay until he dies. The officers have no choice … they cannot stay on the force.
Jim B says
Don’t forget the millions paid by neighborhood associations each year for off duty patrol. And the management district funding of private security guards patrolling through a faux police effort.
They’ve placed off duty PD in marked “police” vehicles that are not HPD units. Westchase District in particular. How can all this private-public police activity be properly supervised? It cannot.
The entire system is in need of a complete overhaul but there are vested interests across the spectrum that will make it difficult. We probably already have the 1000 FTEs on the job via the previously mentioned programs.
However, when I placed a call for three men with a knife threatening a woman at the bus stop across from my business it was a 20 minute response by HPD. I watched, ready to engage them as I’m former military and was armed, but she retreated and they just got on the next METRO bus.
The arriving officer I knew personally as his in-laws live in my subdivision behind the stop. He said he was sorry for the late response, he was the only unit working in the three beats nearby.
There is much to fix and adding 1000 or more without really changing the system will not help.