Police Chief Adderley and the Citizenry
Fort Lauderdale Police Chief Frank Adderley says he wants to listen to the citizenry.
Chief Chats with Citizens
Adderley is in the unenviable position of finding ways to fight rising crime in an austere budget year . And he must do it with a Police force that has about 80 Officers short, on the street, from full staffing levels reached in 2003. Though the City Administration and the new City Commission has given the Chief a full green light to staff up, years of freezing positions, disgruntled Officers leaving for other agencies, and a less than adequate recruiting effort has left the force diminished.
So in an unprecedented move, the Police Chief has recently turned to the citizenry for advice.
The Chief has empanelled a group of Citizens that call themselves "The Chief's Roundtable".
the "Roundtable" in action
This past Tuesday was the second meeting of the group. It consists mainly of representatives of areas in the City that have escalating crime problems,. Tuesday's group included reps from the Beach, the City's central neighborhoods, and the southern neighborhoods that surround Federal Highway.
The session was lively, with lots of talk of bringing back "Community Policing" to the City, finding ways to expedite hiring of new Police Officers, and looking at newer creative techniques that are working in other cities.
Adderley says he finds these sessions helpful, and that he's ready to "accept good ideas, no matter where they come from".
If you think you can be helpful also, send me an e-mail to Tim@TimSmith.com, as I've been helping the Chief identify residents that want to be involved...........
Chief Chats with Citizens
Adderley is in the unenviable position of finding ways to fight rising crime in an austere budget year . And he must do it with a Police force that has about 80 Officers short, on the street, from full staffing levels reached in 2003. Though the City Administration and the new City Commission has given the Chief a full green light to staff up, years of freezing positions, disgruntled Officers leaving for other agencies, and a less than adequate recruiting effort has left the force diminished.
So in an unprecedented move, the Police Chief has recently turned to the citizenry for advice.
The Chief has empanelled a group of Citizens that call themselves "The Chief's Roundtable".
the "Roundtable" in action
This past Tuesday was the second meeting of the group. It consists mainly of representatives of areas in the City that have escalating crime problems,. Tuesday's group included reps from the Beach, the City's central neighborhoods, and the southern neighborhoods that surround Federal Highway.
The session was lively, with lots of talk of bringing back "Community Policing" to the City, finding ways to expedite hiring of new Police Officers, and looking at newer creative techniques that are working in other cities.
Adderley says he finds these sessions helpful, and that he's ready to "accept good ideas, no matter where they come from".
If you think you can be helpful also, send me an e-mail to Tim@TimSmith.com, as I've been helping the Chief identify residents that want to be involved...........
I hope YOU are a member of the round table.
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What a wonderful idea! Tim you have to be a member of this, tell us that you are!
Community Policing would be great & a welcome to the city if we could just get the team together again. (old members or new ~ just to have them would be a plus)
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Advocating for more police is not the answer. Inter communications between existing police agencies would be a first start. Police departments have a horrendous reputation for acting singularly as their own entities and would rather chew their arms off then coordinate with other departments that "we have already paid for" ..If you think its not a fact ponder the Christmas day terrorist attempt to blow up the plane. Its a trickle down effect that is post active and not pre-emptive and it applies to our local Law Enforcement as much as it does the large Federal agencies. South Florida is unique due to its diverse populations and its weather and with those two aspects we have a disproportionate amount of bad guys who are constantly being run thru the "system" ..I don't need more police and all that comes with that until our departments quit running the same criminals thru the same channels day after day. If people added up the monies "we already spend" on Law Enforcement from the locals up to the Feds in this state alone, its amazing we have so much as a shoplifter in this state...
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Chief Adderley is throwing a bone to the community that has already had the meat chewed off of it..Perhaps it would be more prudent to review police protocol, put more stringent efforts in existing policing and strategically have officers "multi-task" than they do now. Ask yourselves, how many citizens have formed "community policing" groups? How many "neighborhood watchdog" groups have been formed? Then ask yourselves, why are we doing this when the "powers that be" keep releasing the same bad guys day after day? Until you demand more from your legislators that let these bottom feeders back out onto the streets to feed, all the community watchdog groups in the world arent going to put a dent in the problem and on top of that, your letting Law Enforcement spoon feed you a steady diet that they arent capable of doing their jobs without you...and you know what the kicker is? Your swallowing it. While your chewing on this, the supreme court has ruled that its NOT Law Enforcements responsibility to protect YOUR Safety...Its obvious by now I am the ultimate cynic here. But until some of you quit high-fiving the city of Ft. Lauderdale's "powers that be" and demand more from your city than your getting, you'll deserve anything you get and unfortunately that applies to people like me who are demanding accountibility from these high-dollar high profile entities...some of us cant do it alone..we are out there on the streets, making people accountable, some of you just look for photo ops or sound bites with these poor excuses for leaders.
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