Jeff McShan did some excellent reporting on HPD’s manpower woes for KHOU-11 this evening.
The entire report should be read, but here are some excerpts:
For months, Houston police officers have been telling 11 News about what they’re calling a severe shortage. They believe the shortage of police officers and detectives hinders their ability to fight crime, and often puts them in dangerous situations.
Union president Hans Marticiuc says he’s hearing the cries for help, too.
“We’re getting calls all the time,” says Marticiuc, “We’ve got officers working a district by themselves, sometimes roll calls are two or three people for an entire roll call. The numbers just don’t add up for the amount of calls that we have to cover.”
If you live in Houston, you might be surprised to know that the number of officers working at HPD is actually 258 less than it was 11 years ago.
Since 1994: 893 officers have retired, 596 resigned, 412 were part of phase-downs, 156 were terminated and 60 officers died.
If you live in Houston and read this blog or listen to Chris Baker, you won’t be surprised.
When asked how serious the situation is, “I think we’re at a critical point. I think we’re at a critical point and our council people need to prioritize here,” Marticiuc says.
Mayor Bill White says he’s working on a solution that includes adding five academy classes this year. There were none a year ago.
He blames the current situation on past administrations and an HPD retirement plan that wasn’t fiscally responsible.
“The police contract was designed when I came in. It was designed to provide an incentive for people to see if they made the pay raise and then resign, because you paid on your retirement based on your last two weeks,” says Mayor White.
The city has not been adding enough cadet classes. It’s been a massive failure of leadership on the part of Mayor White and his council, as they’ve spent time and money on other priorities. Certainly, the Brown Administration did not leave matters in great shape, but he’s gone. Mayor White has been in office long enough to tackle this problem — or to focus on other issues, like Tasers and new badges for cops and downtown parks and finding overtime pay for some cops to harass downtown pedestrians. This is Mayor White’s problem now, not Lee Brown’s, and he has dropped the ball thus far.
“We’re already at a point where we don’t have enough officers on the streets to back each other up,” says Marticiuc.
He says additional money for overtime to place officers where they are needed the most could help.
Council member Ada Edwards disagrees. “Over 80 percent of our budget goes to public safety, so for me it’s not the dollars, it’s the management and I don’t know who’s to blame, but I think we really need to talk about it.”
That may be the first time in her political life Ada Edwards has ever suggested that it’s not the dollars. Unfortunately, it IS partly the dollars. Cadet classes take money. Hiring police officers from other cities takes money. Keeping officers from retiring or seeking police jobs elsewhere takes money. It IS about the dollars, dollars that Mayor White and his council have diverted to other priorities.
Chief Hurtt says he knows his men and women in blue are short-handed.
“I think the citizens of Houston should really continue to support them because we all realize several years, we went without having any academy and several people have retired in the last year or so, but the Houston Police Department is up to meeting the challenge,” says Hurtt.
We DO support the HPD rank and file. We just wish Mayor White, his council, and his police chief could help them out with some more bodies.
