The Los Angeles Police Department seems resigned to six-month delays for many proposed changes, including $27 million to hire 320 new officers and to buy patrol cars. The Los Angeles Times says officials need $4.8 million now to fund the cornerstone of new Chief William J. Bratton’s permanent reforms, reorganization. Said Bratton: “It might seem like a small amount of money to some. But it’s vital to turning around this department and this is money we need now, not later.”
The reorganization funding would pay for 101 new positions and unfreeze 150 vacant positions. It serves a larger purpose: filling the command ranks with the supervisors, detective commanders, sergeants and lieutenants of Bratton’s choice.
Bratton wants 18 new sergeants and 18 new lieutenants to head teams fighting street gangs, the major factor in the city’s rising murder rate. He has stressed that Los Angeles needs a counterterrorism bureau that will circumvent terrorism rather than react after the fact. A third area of major concern is devoting resources to ensure that the department complies with its promised reforms sought by the U.S. Justice Department.
Link: http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-bud22may22,1,4310299.story?coll=la%2Dheadlines%2Dcalifornia