Ready, Fire, Aim — The Operation Disrupt Edition
Today, we get a hilarious press release from the Mayor’s Office announcing that the WPD’s Operation Disrupt is now coming back. This is the Operation Disrupt put into place with great fanfare after multiple shootings in January — pulling the city’s Community Police Unit, as well as resources from other special units to flood the streets of certain sections of the city with officers. And only for eight hours in the evening and only for 5 days a week. Sundays were covered by NCCOPD and Mondays were covered on an ad hoc basis. Operation Disrupt started winding down in March and by the time that the WPSSC presented its report, Operation Disrupt was a shadow of its former self, with most of the special unit officers returned to their units and the CPU officers preparing to move on to other assignments. This is March 31. The NJ reported that Operation Disrupt was being reconfigured into a 7 officer unit that would specifically target certain areas. Then it said that Operation Disrupt was over on June 5, which may be when the original configuration ended. And then — TA DA! — Operation Disrupt (with an official DL breakdown of — Disturbingly Impetuous Self-Serving Rascals Using Power Terribly (thanks mediawatch!) — is BACK and Mayor and the Chief are pulling the newly deployed CPU to do the Disrupt effort.
Got that? Now take a look at this bit of comedic propaganda posing as a press release from the Mayor’s Office. Let’s start here:
Although a near unanimous council voted to support the implementation of the commission’s recommendations, council leadership has yet to move forward on a vote to provide the funding resources needed to support the chief’s plan. In the absence of council approval of funding for these critical public safety resources along with the recent end of state supported foot patrols, Chief Cummings has decided to act.
Council did vote to support the implementation. And then Chief Cummings did not present Council with a budget that incorporated the funds he thought he needed to implement the WPSSC Plan. He was specifically asked — multiple times — about resources to implement and he was not prepared to ask for those funds then. During the budget process, folks, when you are supposed to ask for money. It took City Council to add the funds to get additional monitors for cameras and to get a survey and plan for the current set of cameras. Council also added more funds for an Academy, in case the WPD found itself drawn down to a point where it needed to start a new class. This would mean that they could start one without waiting for Council to allocate funds. It is just there. The Chief was not ready to ask for funds for his new management or anything else during the regular process of budgeting. He did come back to ask for funds for senior management. That was not approved by Council. Largely because they were spending surplus funds that do not exist yet AND because I think people are confused over a WPD Safety Plan that claims that they have done much of the implementation of the WPSSC, but somehow needs new management after the fact. So what the Chief and the Mayor are doing is dismantling the one thing the community really wants — the Community Police Unit — because City Council won’t give them $500K that doesn’t exist for management that they no longer need. But the Chief never asked for more funds to put more officers in the street. Never.
Add to the fact thet he never asked for more street resources, he is Whining about foot patrols that are no longer funded by the State. The WPD isn’t a full month into their new budget cycle and they are still whinging about funds. Why weren’t these foot patrols included in the budget the Chief submitted to the Council? He had time to do that. But once again, we are looking at a problem of this department not using their own resources well. They are close to full strength of 320 sworn officers, meaning they have the people they need to get the job done. So instead of reallocating folks from desk jobs or other units, they want to dismantle the CPU. The funds from the AG’s office paid for overtime, because the WPD was so short staffed. Now they aren’t, so they don’t need the overtime (plus they’ve told us that they’ve done the work to get their OT issues under control, which itself frees up money). Just don’t need it. But I’m calling it now — the WPD will be back in front of Council in early winter to ask for OT funds.
And I have no idea if the stats they quote are correct. Based upon past experience, though, it is reasonable to expect that they are wrong.
But here is the game:
“If we are going to effectively crack down on violent crime in our city, we will need more public safety and community based resources,” said Mayor Dennis P. Williams. “While we will continue to work with City Council, State and Federal leaders to find support for the additional resources […]
They just want more money. Period. Four weeks into a budget year, they are trying to hold the CPU as hostages to getting more money. Even though they could not be bothered to submit a budget that included their needs to implement the WPSSC, they are willing to utterly undermine their own efforts in communities by withdrawing the folks doing the connecting. Apparently, we are meant to tell Council and the State that we need more money. I’m calling Bullshit on that. Mayor Williams and Chief Cummings need to remember that their job is the safety of the citizens of this city, not shaking down Delaware taxpayers. If they wanted more funds, they should have done that during the budget process — submitting a budget (and revenue increases) that would have covered this effort. In the meantime, they need to roll up their sleeves and figure out how to get more out of the resources they have. A thing that the businesses in this city are doing on the daily.
Are you living in Wilmington? Then call or email your Councilperson and tell them that you want the WPD to get their work done and stop angling for money. Call or email the Mayor and the Chief and tell them to work harder on safety than on their shakedown. And tell them all that Community Policing must come back to the communities.
Tags: Bamboozled!, City of Wilmington, Featured, Mayor Dennis Williams
Then again, perhaps the Mayor just finds it easier to move officers out of the CPU than it is to get the CPU officers a phone.
These press releases and emails they send out are an embarrassment!
Did you all see Council President Gregory’s response?
Wednesday, July 29, 2015
Wilmington City Council President Urges Mayor to Stay Focused on Crime and Not on Placing Blame for His Public Safety Deficiencies
Wilmington City Council President Theo Gregory issued a statement tonight regarding comments in a news release issued this afternoon by Mayor Williams announcing the Administration’s decision to reactivate a policing plan entitled Operation Disrupt.
The statement is as follows:
“Mayor Williams is responsible for police operations in Wilmington and if he wants to reactivate Operation Disrupt, then that’s his prerogative. The gauge of how well the Mayor is handling the crime issue will eventually be determined by the voters. I would urge the Mayor to put all of his efforts and rhetoric into fighting crime and stop blaming others for his failures in reducing violent crime. It angers me that in today’s news release the Mayor, as well Police Chief Cummings, would attempt to blame Council in some way because the Mayor is forced to reactivate Operation Disrupt. He alludes to the fact that Council did not support his recent attempt to hire up to four new police administrators. The Mayor did not ask Council for more police officers for the streets because he knows, and the recent crime commission report confirmed, that Wilmington has enough officers to police the City. The officers just have to be deployed properly. I am very disappointed that the Mayor did not plan ahead for the loss of special funding for streets patrols. He should have been more proactive and not as reactive knowing that the summer months are here and crime has a tendency to spike at this time of year. He should begin now to deploy the police correctly, and reach out to the State and County police for assistance if necessary. I again urge him to fight crime and stop fighting people who believe that we’ve got to get crime under control and must manage the police more efficiently. City Council remains open to working with the Mayor to solve the crime problem. There was not enough support among Council Members recently for the hiring of more police administrators. Council has not heard from the Mayor about moving forward. The ball is in his court.”
The scariest thing about Wilmington is Williams and Cummings. I’d bet just removing them would improve things.
This morning I learn that Chief Cummings apparently did not know about the reinstatement of Operation Disrupt until reporters called him to talk about it.
What really concerns me is that we have enough talk about people who will primary the mayor, but they will only split the votes between themselves enough to give this clown another win.
I was curious about what if any effect Wilmington police no longer having to live in the city has had on crime.
Not that they would be necessarily living in this higher crime areas, but none the less, I was wondering what statistics if any there are
Theo Gregory’s response is interesting, and I would think that every single City Councilperson would be aggressively pushing back on the Mayor’s BS here. The thing that Theo Gregory needs to come to terms with here is not aggressively using the budget process (the place where Council has the most leverage) to force more change. He claims to be doing a quarterly review of the WPD’s progress towards WPSSC recommendations, but don’t see how that will produce any accountability, really.
I have always believed police should live in the city. As a cop’s kid I watched what happened when they started moving out.
Years ago they could move out after living in the city for so many years. The cops that left the city were more interested in trashing their old neighborhoods (and signalling their superiority in their new ones – same old story) than in policing. It was almost as if their decision to move was justified by whatever crime occurred in the city. Seriously, they would point to city crime (the flippin’ job they were responsible for) and then pat themselves on the back for moving out of the city. Their favorite saying at the end of the day? “I’m heading home to god’s country.”
@dv, as far as I know there are no stats trying to correlate where the WPD lives with the city’s crime problem. There are a number of people who think that not requiring the WPD (and other city employees) to live here was a big mistake. Their reasoning is that having officers (and others) live in the city would help promote the kind of connections to the communities they serve that they keep struggling to connect to. The “occupying army” thing is related to a perception of a police force that has little investment in the city besides their job. Don’t know if this is true, but have seen some alarming commentary about the people who live in the city from WPD folks. That might happen no matter where they live.
The biggest thing that eliminating the requirement to live in the city did was to signal to everyone else that the city wasn’t a good choice to be in.
Cass, that’s sort of my thought. The police aren’t vested in the community like they would be if they lived there. They get to drive home and away from the mess. Disconnect from it. Then the next day drive into work and start all over again.
To me it seems like you can’t help but create an “other” mentality. When it isn’t your own community you are policing, but an’other’ person’s community I can see resentment building. A disconnect, a quicker road to not caring about what you are doing.
I have nothing but anecdotal evidence, but it sure seems you could make a linear correlation to when the rules changed and an upward tick in violence. As police leave the community that 24 hour presence leaves with them. People know when a cop lives on a block. They know where “they” live.
Again, another great post
Great article. Could you edit and submit it to the NJ for the opinion page? Might get wider notice. I agree the pulling of the Community officer was a thumb in the eye to those that opposed the addition of 2 inspectors, who were NOT called for in the Commission report.
@Cassandra_m if what you report about Cummings not being aware of this operational turn about until he heard from a reporter is accurate we are worse off than I imagined; and I have a vivid imagination.
That news has me truly frightened.
God help us all.
Dorian Gray below reports that he heard from a WPD Captain last night that the Community Police Units won’t be disturbed for this. Trust, but verify indeed.
WDEL actually covered the meeting.
http://www.wdel.com/story/69671-video-police-urge-wilmington-residents-to-be-on-lookout-for-potential-burglars-thieves
The claim that DISRUPT would not be impacting Community Police Unit assignments was made the Capt. William Brown – who I believe is the captain of the CPU. I think he made a caveat – something like “at this point”. Since the DISRUPT 2.0 reboot is fairly new I guess nobody knows for sure.
It was a well attended meeting and I think Capt. Brown knew what answer the people wanted… so that could have something to do with it as well. For know I’ll take him at his word.
Thanks, dg. We’ll see what we’ll see, I guess. There’s not much to rely on anymore from these folks.
As far as living in the city, I’m pretty firmly on the fence about that. People with kids live where their kids will get the education they want for them. And until that situation improves in the city, I’m not comfortable being on the side of making them all live here.
I would like to complain about the accuracy of the headline. There is no evidence that Mayor Williams ever aims, even after he fires.
It is my understanding CPU is under the sector Captain. So perhaps Captain Brown will leave these 2 in place. Each Sector captain will likely have to determine where to lull guys/ gals from. but I chatted with an officer who believed he was being moved out of CPU had was told the same by someone close to a CPU Officer.
I don’t believe an officer must live in the city to be good at the job. Two officers I interact with havr great relationships with the community. I would think there are many more like them.
“If we are going to effectively crack down on violent crime in our city, we will need more public safety and community based resources,” said Mayor Dennis P. Williams. “While we will continue to work with City Council, State and Federal leaders to find support for the additional resources […]
They have community based resources: Sweep the Streets & Delaware Crime Stoppers! These non-profit organizations get little support from businesses & others in Delaware and are saving the tax payers money. They do a great job in helping the police solve crimes & should be utilized more!
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Sweep-the-Streets/1429726987257306
http://delaware.crimestoppersweb.com/