In the 1970s, the term “hollow military” was used to describe the state of the U.S. Armed Forces. It remained formidable on paper, but in actuality was underfunded and overstretched.
“Hollow police force” may soon describe the Los Angeles Police Department. Drastic reductions in the civilian workforce, which performs vital administrative functions, has forced sworn officers from patrolling L.A. streets into offices where many are performing civilian personnel functions. In addition, officers are forced to stay home rather than fill vacancies in patrols because of strict limits on overtime.
As the LAPPL spelled out in a news release today, it is a myth that the LAPD has been exempt from the city’s budget cuts. The impact of officers being taken off the streets because of overtime concerns, and filling in for furloughed civilians or vacant civilian jobs, are very real. City officials need to carefully consider the impact of budget cuts and realize the consequences to public safety of any actions that increase police response time and decrease patrols in our city. These widespread cuts, in combination with forced time off, are resulting in significantly reduced police deployments throughout the city that threaten to create a public safety crisis this summer.
The fact is that civilian personnel perform duties that are crucial to effective law enforcement, such as taking 9-1-1 calls, warrant processing, data entry for suspect booking, grant writing and crime statistics analysis. If civilians aren't available to fulfill these critical roles, the responsibilities are shifted to sworn officers.
The numbers are real and troubling. At the end of the last fiscal year (June 2009), 3,958 civilian positions were authorized for LAPD. As of today, there are less than 3,000 LAPD civilian employees. That level is expected to drop to below 2,900 by July 1, 2010. In all, over 1,000 civilian jobs will be eliminated, and their roles will have to be filled by sworn officers.
As we pointed out in our release today, for every 100 officers who are pulled from field work to backfill vacant civilian positions, it is the equivalent of removing about 30 police cars citywide – and that has a dramatic impact on our ability to respond to calls for service and keep crime down. We are getting reports on a daily basis from our officers that they are spending increasing amounts of time in the station performing administrative tasks, rather than fighting crime on the streets. This threatens to reverse the LAPD's historic crime reductions in recent years.
The city cannot tolerate any further reductions in the civilian LAPD workforce. Many of the positions already cut need to be reinstated on a priority basis.
