Tuesday, March 04, 2008
Ballard's Changes At IMPD On The Right Track
Whether you agree or disagree with some of his personnel decisions, you have to hand it to Mayor Greg Ballard for some of the changes he's implementing in the way IMPD combats crime in our city. A Star article discusses an ex-offender program he's planning to develop, but some of the other changes will be even more music to the ears of residents in distressed neighborhoods. A more focused community policing plan will involve neighborhood leaders; renewed efforts will target higher crime areas; there will be closer monitoring of parolees; the abandoned home problem will be tackled; and the use of civilians to handle routine police reports will free up police officers to focus on more serious matters, among other new initiatives. A lot of these changes will not require additional spending, which makes them even more appealing. Let's hope these changes make a difference.
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7 comments:
It's great to see the department back on track. We still have quite a few Petrson/Anderson mistakes to fix..but overall, I'm very happy with the progress that's been made so far.
These aren't changes, they are proposed changes. Some of these things are a lot easier said than done
I think one of the best things is that it frees up Frank Anderson to monitor what is going on at the jails, which he has completely failed to do since he was elected.
Does anyone know if the station at 42nd & College is reopening? It basically closed after the merger. I've seen a number of cars and uniformed officers going in and out there in the past few days.
At least someone is trying to propose and act on the changes.
:)
The 42nd/College station was a tremendous resource for the whole northside, and it anchored an area in transition. I hope it reopens.
And the community transition thing is brilliant. Recitivism is a huge problem, and although it's not necessarily the Mayor's problem to solve, if he doens't do something about it, he has to take the blame for the huge increases in crime associated with heavy recitivism.
I heard the Mayor explain these programs, and the Lincoln Plowman thing, on Abdul's radio show this morning. I heard some testiness in Ballard's voice, as well, saying he was "getting a ltitle tired" of the criticism associated with the IMPD stuff. He said something of which I wasn't aware: his top command structure had to have a certain Sheriff-IPD ratio, and I wasn't aware of that. (Is it true?)
He still cannot explain the Plowman hire sufficiently for me. He said on the radio show, that Plowman was enormously respected by the LEO community, which is not what I've heard or observed.
How refreshing -- an elected official who has been in office less than two months and is already acting on substantive policy changes that will directly benefit the good of the public. I was ambivalent about Ballard before, but he has impressed me over these past couple of weeks.
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