Fringe Benefits

 Anyone who's worked Patrol over the past year or two knows that the EHPD fleet of vehicles is in pretty bad shape. While we have a few newer vehicles many of the older ones are in various states of disrepair and are constantly in and out of the shop for repairs due to break downs or crash damage. As a result many of the cars that are still on the road end up running 24/7 as the oncoming shift often has to call the outgoing shift in off the road to take their cars.

So, we were glad to see in some documents we received that we are budgeted to get 6 new cruisers, and one new K9 vehicle. The existing K9 cars are in especially bad condition, being Crown Victoria models that haven't been produced since the 2011 model year.

However it was pretty surprising to see this sentence in the document that after the patrol vehicles were purchased, "remaining monies to be utilized for purchasing a 2021 Chevy Tahoe LS for the Chief of Police." While East Hartford Police Chiefs and Deputy Chiefs have long gotten free take home cars as a fringe benefit, this purchase is surprising because Chief Sansom just recently got a 2020 Ford Explorer. So I wouldn't think that SUV is already so worn out that he needs to replace it with a brand new 2021 Tahoe with a $52,600 starting MSRP. And his Deputies are also currently driving relatively new Ford Explorers as well.

The other problem with this is that ever since Chief Sansom was hired, he has taken to purchasing non-Police package vehicles for himself and his Deputies, instead opting for more expensive, fancier civilian models. The previous Chief, Mark Sirois, would purchase a new vehicle for himself nearly annually, but his take home vehicle was usually a basic Police package fleet vehicle, the same as everyone else. That way when he got a new vehicle, his old one could simply be rotated into the fleet at no loss to the overall Department. With these civilian spec vehicles Chief Sansom opts to purchase however, there is very limited use for them after he's done with them since they can't be equipped for Patrol and aren't pursuit rated.

Chevrolet actually sells two models of Police specific Tahoes, a PPV and SSV, which can usually be had for less money than the civilian models, and come pre-wired for Police equipment like radios, computers, and lights. However these models usually come with a far more basic exterior appearance, and a stripped down interior devoid of higher end features, they prioritize function over form. On the civilian model the Chief is purchasing for himself, the Town will also have to pay extra to get it wired up on top of the already increased purchase price, further inflating the cost.

So what does any of this have to do with us? Well it comes back to a recurring theme on this blog, where the Town and their officials have consistently told us that they don't have money to afford things like training, equipment, raises, or better health insurance. But when the time comes to buy the Chief yet another new up-specced SUV or other Administrative want, suddenly the cash flows. They seem to be selectively broke when it's convenient for them, yet flush with cash when they want to be. So I thought I'd try to find a few things the Department could purchase with about $55,000 if the Chief could bear to drive his old 2020 Explorer for another year. 

For about $53,000 we could acquire another new K9 car. The three in use right now are relatively dilapidated, and only one currently appears to be budgeted to be replaced. 

For about $51,000 you could also purchase brand new ballistic vests for about half the Department. Manufacturers usually recommend replacement about every 5 years.

For just a few thousand dollars we could get all new, and a greater number of computers for the Patrol report writing room. Currently we don't even have enough computers for an entire squad to use them at the same time, and often times at least one isn't working. It's not uncommon to see Officers standing in the back of the room waiting their turn to use a computer, especially during the overlap period between shifts. 

In fact, for $55,000 you could even outfit about half of Patrol with brand new laptops (Or all of Patrol with refurbished). This way each Officer could have their own computer that they put in a docking station inside the car like many other Departments do instead of having desktops in the building and tablets permanently installed in the cars.

$55,000 can be used to pay for a good portion of the cost of a used armored vehicle for the SWAT team. They haven't had an armored car since the old one caught on fire while driving down Route 2 a several years back and have since resorted to driving around in what is effectively a box truck. A new armored truck would obviously make it much safer for our team members to operate in the field on volatile scenes.

$55,000 could also pay for about 957 hours of overtime so Officers and Detectives can do things like follow up on cases and respond to crime scenes. Or you put together crime prevention details to tackle the epidemic of auto thefts and car burglaries that seems to have no end in sight. Or you could just use it to pay for the overtime we're incurring every day due to being short staffed.

You could also use that money to pay for the necessary retraining we all now need to re-learn how to do our jobs without getting arrested under the new Police Accountability Act. This law has fundamentally changed how Policing works in Connecticut, yet we haven't really received any new training on what we're supposed to be doing differently now. This has left our members in limbo wondering what to do, and at risk of having their lives ruined by simply doing what they have been trained since day 1 of their careers.

Then of course there's the obvious, we could just buy another Patrol car... and have money left over.

I could keep going on, but I think the point is made. The priorities of the people in charge here are just backwards. A good manager would want to ensure that the people working on the front lines have the training and equipment they need to do their jobs effectively, and are well compensated before spending money that we supposedly don't have to buy unnecessary new family vehicles for themselves on the taxpayer's dime.

There will be a new Mayor coming into Office by the end of the year, hopefully whoever that ends up being will take a hard look at how the dollars are being spent at EHPD.

Not Even Pretending Anymore

 Early Thursday morning an armed car burglary suspect opened fire on two East Hartford Officers and a citizen complainant while fleeing from the scene of the crime with his accomplice. Fortunately by sheer luck nobody was struck by the bullet, however the suspects managed to escape (Click here for the full story). This incident seems to be part of an escalation that's occurred over the last few years and has really ticked up over the past 12 months. We've seen things like car break-ins, thefts, and shootings increase in frequency, as well as more suspects fleeing from Officers trying to stop them, both in cars and on foot. Now we're seeing suspects responding to Officers with deadly force for daring to try and stop them from stealing a few bucks out of someone's cup holder.

This escalation is most likely related to the current anti-Police attitudes embraced by our State politicians who emboldened criminals with their Anti-Police "reform" bill that they forced through along party lines last summer. Our hands have been tied and our members have been demonized by rhetoric pushed for political gain, and the bad guys know it. 

But we've written about this problem before, and we warned of it along with numerous other Unions and Police groups before the law's passage. Now those ominous predictions are coming to fruition. But I think we all hoped that even with the national media and the politicians turning on us and using the Police as scapegoats for their failed policies, that we'd at least have support from our Administrators who used to be cops themselves way back when. But that hasn't been the case. 

When that shooting occurred Thursday morning Chief Sansom was out of State on vacation, so he had left his number two man Deputy Chief Hawkins as Acting Chief in his absence. When DC Hawkins was called in the early morning hours and informed about two of his employees being shot at, he never came in to work to see the scene for himself or check on his guys, or even just show his support. Instead he made a few phone calls and then presumably went back to bed. As if that wasn't bad enough, when the members on scene requested he send the Detective Bureau out on overtime to help collect and process evidence so we could try to identify the suspects before they catch another Officer off guard, DC Hawkins actually pushed back and questioned why we needed Detectives to come out before eventually relenting and allowing only one Detective and an Investigator to come in. This behavior just further shows that this Administration is beyond maintaining even the mere appearance of giving a damn about their employees' wellbeing. 

Their sole concern these days seems to be cutting the budget and pinching every penny they can. That is unless of course we're talking about raises for themselves where Chief Sansom just took a $30,000 raise (sorry, "market adjustment") for himself and Hawkins is proposed to get an $11,000 bump with the new, unnecessary Assistant Chief position that's being created for him. Meanwhile their employees continue to be some of the lowest paid in the region and that shows no signs of changing.

This Administration's policy of slashing costs with no regard has helped put us in this hole we're in today. Our pro-active unit has been completely dissolved, our Detective Bureau is rarely ever allowed to come in and do details to target crime hot spots and other issues, and even several members of our Traffic Unit are being required to do double duty by also performing Patrol functions. And on top of that any Officer who tries to do pro-active work has to worry about having IA come after them even if something completely out of their control goes wrong. 

A Police Department isn't a business, we don't sell anything and we don't make money. Our job is to stop and prevent crime, but we don't control the criminals, or when or where the crime happens. When crime goes up you need to put guys on it, and that costs money, but that's just the price of having a good Police Department.

Personnel Appeals Board Update

 We were scheduled to resume the PAB hearings virtually last night after nearly a year's delay due to COVID concerns, with another hearing scheduled for tonight. Unfortunately one of the panel members didn't show or wasn't aware of the hearing and it was cancelled. Tonight's hearing was also cancelled due to some miscommunication about scheduling that we thought had been ironed out. It's very disappointing and ridiculous that this process has been unnecessarily dragged out this long while our members have patiently waited. 

Even the Mayor chimed in during the hearing to voice her displeasure with all of the delays. But we'd like to point out that this process could have and should have been wrapped up over a year ago had the Town not insisted on pursuing their gag orders to block the people involved from publicly speaking about what actually happened with the test scores. Or they could've just not done what they did that caused our members to file appeals in the first place. Of course we can't disclose what happened here due to said order, but needless to say people don't usually pursue gag orders to cover up totally legitimate behavior, so read into that what you will.

So this process drags on further, we have new dates scheduled though the end of next month now. Remember this test was initially given back in the Spring of 2019. The Town has been unable to fill these Sergeant vacancies since then, and in fact more vacancies have opened as more Sergeants have since retired. I can't imagine how many tens of thousands of dollars (or more) the Town has spent paying overtime to existing Sergeants to fill in for the vacancies that should have been filled by these candidates over the last 2 years. Nor can I calculate how much income the candidates have lost out on due to the actions of the Town in this matter. Hopefully someone can do that math and find a way to make these members whole.

CALEA is all done, so why are still paying $110,135 annually for it, while critical services go unfunded?

Last month the Administration wrapped up the project that's been their main focus since they got here in 2014 of obtaining CALEA accreditation. There was an earlier post back in July where we went over the high cost of getting accredited and how it's generally useless to the employees and the people of the Town so we wont rehash that here.

What I'd like to discuss is now that we have the accreditation, what's it going to cost us year to year to maintain it, and how it's disrupting the core Police functions of the Department. The finances of the Department aren't really the business of the Union, we don't have any say in what they spend money on. However when we have important training being cut and denied to our members, and our SWAT team struggling to obtain basic equipment they need to do their jobs safely because the Administration claims it doesn't have the funding, it becomes our business.

Shortly after this Administration took Office in 2014 they created a full time position for an Officer to work on Accreditation. Now that we've completed it that Officer has not been pulled from that assignment and continues to work on... I don't know what, while collecting a base salary of $74,209 plus benefits. This wouldn't be a problem except for the fact that we currently have a staffing shortage Department wide. In fact when I asked why we haven't made any more Detectives off our current active list I was told it was because the Chief was concerned about Patrol staffing and didn't want to promote anyone unnecessarily because then they would become ineligible to work Patrol. So they've effectively sacrificed an investigative position that does actual Police work directly benefiting the citizens in order to maintain an accreditation position that no longer serves any real purpose. This seems counterintuitive considering the stated mission of CALEA is to provide Chiefs with "a blueprint that promotes the efficient use of resources and improves service delivery." Doesn't this seem like the push for CALEA has in fact made us use resources less efficiently and been detrimental to our delivery of core Police services?

Furthermore, a part time consultant was also hired to assist with Accreditation at a rate of $31,861 a year. This consultant also still works here despite the job he was brought in to consult on being completed. I did consulting work myself prior to becoming an Officer, and at every job I had as soon as the work I was hired to do was done, I was let go and moved on to the next one. So why is this guy being kept on staff, is he now a permanent employee? What's he doing now?

After the Accreditation was completed, our Department sent a delegation consisting of seven people to the CALEA Conference in Kentucky for a week. That included the entire command staff and the Mayor. That's flights, hotel rooms, and probably rental cars for seven people coming out of our budget that's apparently so strapped we cant afford basic equipment needed to do our jobs. And why was a part time employee taken on a field trip to Kentucky while our Officers are regularly being denied off site training classes they actually need to do their jobs supposedly due to funding shortages? Seems like the Chief has his priorities backwards.

So where could this money be better spent rather than on Accreditation? Let's dive into some of the ongoing issues the supposed lack of funding has created. First off look at our firearms unit. We're down to training once a year with our duty weapons, and when we do get to shoot we're limited in how much we can actually shoot due to a lack of ammunition because we cant afford it. We don't use our firearms frequently, but when we do, proficiency is critical to ensure the safety of our Officers and those we serve. Any firearms expert will tell you shooting is skill that is heavily reliant on repetition and muscle memory, once a year just isn't enough to build that up.

We also have non lethal beanbag shotguns sitting in our armory that our Firearms Unit has been trying to get out to Officers on the road for over a year. But the Admin refuses to authorize the training for these tools so we have another non lethal option available on hot calls. I can only assume this refusal is cost related because there doesn't seem to be any other logical explanation. Holding up the rollout of these shotguns could have the effect of forcing us to use lethal force when we maybe wouldn't have to if there was another option available.

Additionally we've heard from several members of the SWAT team that all of their ballistic vests and helmets are well past their expiration dates and Deputy Chief Hawkins has refused to authorize the purchase of replacement equipment. Yes this equipment is expensive, but once purchased it's good for ten years. Some of our SWAT Officers are wearing hand me down uniforms that are several sizes too big for them, and some of them weren't given any uniform at all and are instead forced to wear their US military issued uniforms or personally owned clothes to calls. How are we so broke that we cant even afford to buy a couple pairs of pants and shirts, but Accreditation has a blank check book?

You may also remember a while back when our 30+ year old SWAT armored vehicle caught on fire while driving on Route 2 and was totaled. That vehicle was never replaced, instead our SWAT team rides around in what is basically a moving van with no armor plating whatsoever. We had an opportunity to obtain a free used armored car from Brinks, all we had to do was go to a conference near Washington DC, fill out the paperwork and drive it home. Somehow DC Hawkins managed to make it all the way down there on the Town's dime, spend a few days hob knobbing at the conference, and never filled out the paperwork to get the truck, coming home empty handed. His explanation to the SWAT team was that he couldn't find the Brinks booth at the convention center. Now ignoring the fact that he simply could have asked someone for directions at any point during the several days he spent there, I've heard from others who were at that conference that the Brinks booth was literally the first thing you saw when you walked in the door. It was so prominent in fact that several people mistook it for the general information booth. I don't know if this is incompetence or intentional, but either way it's foolish to waste an opportunity to get free equipment that we desperately need.

Interestingly enough, when the CALEA on site evaluators came to EHPD to do their inspection, that very day a brand new armored SWAT vehicle appeared in our parking lot for them to inspect. However as soon as they left, the brand new SWAT truck disappeared, never to be seen again. I hear it was on loan from another Department. Does the Administration think our SWAT team is a joke? Do they have no respect or concern for the safety of any of the Officers who train hard to be on it? I cant think of any explanation other than complete incompetence for their actions here. We have highly skilled Officers who've quit the team because it's been so neglected over the years. This leaves both our Officers on street, and the citizens of the Town in a more dangerous position.

Our fleet is in shambles, training is at bare minimum levels, our guns don't shoot straight, and we don't have enough computers for a whole squad to use at the same time, and God forbid you need a pen or a notepad, they wont buy us those anymore either! We don't even allow employees below the rank of Sergeant have access to color printers because the toner is too expensive. And sadly that's just the tip of the dysfunction iceberg.

We all understand this isn't Glastonbury, money isn't falling off trees in East Hartford. But how can you impose such strict austerity upon your employees while spending lavishly on your pet projects right under our noses and expect us to see it as anything other than disrespectful?

Accreditation has been the greatest fraud perpetrated on this Department and this Town in my tenure here. Chief Sansom told the Journal Inquirer "Achieving Accreditation helps safeguard the integrity of this Department and ensures consistent delivery of high quality public safety services. It's a mark of excellence." In our experience as line Officers it's done just the opposite while burdening us with unnecessary policies and requirements that do nothing to better our performance. We implore Chief Sansom, do the right thing, invest in your Department and your employees before you burn this organization down to a smoking heap. But hey, I guess it'll at least be an Accredited smoking heap, right?

CALEA: What's the point, what's it cost, and is it worth it?

For the last 5 years EHPD has been working towards Accreditation from CALEA (Commission for Accreditation of Law Enforcement Agencies.), and over the last 12 months or so the Administration has made a massive push to get the effort over the finish line. The issue we have with it is that this effort has at times come at the expense of the actual Law Enforcement function of our Department as funds and personnel have been cut from operational and investigatory purposes to allow Accreditation to have a blank check book. So the questions have to be asked, what is Accreditation, how much has it cost us, and how can it help the average employee do their job? We're going to try and break down the answers to those questions here in this post.

So first off, what is CALEA? It's a privately run organization under the umbrella of the IACP (International Association of Chiefs of Police.) that's run by a Commission of 21 members, only half of whom actually have Law Enforcement experience. This Commission is supposed to develop policies that are considered "best practices" and then convince Police Departments to adopt their policies and give the Commission money for the right to call themselves "accredited" and put a plaque in their lobby and stickers on their cruisers. According to their website, for an Agency the size of ours, the initial Accreditation fee is currently $11,450, with an annual charge of $4,065 every year thereafter, plus the cost of airfare, lodging, transportation, and stipend for the CALEA certified assessors to do their on site reviews. That may not sound like a ton of money, but it's more than we have budgeted to be spent this year on criminal investigation technology (who needs technology anyway?), and almost as much as we have budgeted for SWAT protective equipment for our team that's wearing ill fitting hand me down uniforms if they have uniforms at all.

While we're on the topic of money, let's look at how much this project has cost the Agency overall. Everyone working at EHPD over the last few years has become familiar with our motto, no not the Serving with Pride and Integrity one, but the real one you hear every time you actually need something to do your job, that's right; "There's no money in the budget." But somehow despite this Admin mantra, money has always been found to keep the Accreditation Department going at full steam.

So let's do some rough math, for about 5 years now, we've had one full time Officer assigned to Accreditation, let's assume an average base salary there of around $71,500 over that time period, that comes out to about $357,500. They've also hired a part time clerk to assist with Accreditation who's been there for at least 4 years I believe, at an average base salary of about $30,000, which comes out to another $120,000. About a year ago they also hired on another full time civilian "Research Analyst" to assist at a base salary of $73,160. There's also a Deputy Chief tasked with overseeing the entire process at $99,915. Additionally there have been several Lieutenants in and out of the process as well through the years at varying degrees of involvement, each one making around $90,000 average base salary over this time period. Now let's not forget that for several months before the on site visit this past June the Administration also pulled an Officer from Patrol and an Investigator from our Narcotics unit to work in Accreditation full time, each one pulling a base salary of $73,474 and $74,146 respectively.

So just looking at these rough figures you can see we are easily in the hole to this process for between $500,000 and 1 million dollars over the last 5 years. And that's without calculating overtime (which has been substantial.) or benefits, or all the other employees who were pulled from their main jobs to help out with Accreditation here and there over the last five years. 

Additionally many Departments who obtain Accreditation have to keep someone on staff full time as a compliance Officer, whose sole purpose is to ensure the Agency stays up to date with the latest from the Commission and prepares everything for the triannual re-certifications and walk throughs. I assume we would keep the full time Officer we already have in that role at a base salary of $74,209, which brings the annual cost of maintaining Accreditation with CALEA fees to $78,274 plus benefits. If they choose to also keep the part time clerk on staff at his current base salary of $31,861, that raises the annual cost to $110,135, which coincidentally is $10,135 more than we currently have budgeted for overtime for the Criminal Investigations Division to actually work on cases.

Now the real issue here isn't that the Administration is spending inordinate amounts of money on this pet project, it's that while this money is being spent other parts of the Department are rotting on the vine due to a lack of funding. For example; Patrol Officers are no longer all issued cameras for taking crime scene photos, instead only a handful have them. Our SWAT vehicle caught on fire and burned up due to neglect and disrepair and now years later it still hasn't been replaced. Our Evidence truck leaks and has mold issues and hasn't been fixed. Live fire handgun and rifle training has been cut down to only once a year, and I'm constantly hearing from employees that they are denied access to outside training courses they need to advance their careers and subsequently, the quality of the Agency. The worst of all in my opinion is our Detectives and Investigators being denied overtime they need to follow up on cases and come out to crime scenes to investigate serious crimes that occur in their off hours. Our Detectives want to come out and work these cases, but often times they haven't been allowed, why? Because "there's no money in the budget." These examples are just the tip of the iceberg.

These are real issues that not only negatively affect us as employees, but also the people of the Town who are losing out on better quality Police Services. I think having a properly trained and equipped Patrol Division and SWAT team ready to protect you, or an actual trained Detective on scene to investigate when you're a victim of a crime is more important to the average East Hartford resident than being able to say their local Police Department is accredited by a Commission no one outside of Law Enforcement has ever heard of.

This brings us to our final points, how can CALEA Accreditation help us as employees, and what's the purpose? We've seen the constant raft of new policies come down with CALEA citations over the years, sometimes they're minor changes to existing policies, and other times entirely new ones. In some cases we've gotten new and useful training we didn't previously have because CALEA required it, like CPR and Defensive Tactics, other times, it's a complete waste, like having the entire membership sit through an All Hazards training class where the material really only applied to Supervisors. It's been a bit of a mixed bag but overall there hasn't really been anything yet that completely changes the way we do our job, we've pretty much carried on as we have been for decades. So I'd argue Accreditation really hasn't done much at all to improve working conditions, or give new resources to solve cases for the average employee. What it has done however, is sap monetary resources from things that could have improved the Agency more substantially.

Here is where I have a really crazy idea, if CALEA Accreditation is really about bettering the Agency by enacting these new policies, then why not just put the policies in place, but forego the costly Accreditation process completely? There's nothing stopping the Department from doing this, and as an added benefit, they could choose to enact the policies we like and that would actually benefit us, and ignore the ones that don't. And they'd be free to modify any of them as they see fit to make them work better without having to conform to CALEA's strict standards. Under this method, we'd get all of the benefits of Accreditation without any of the cost or other downsides. The Agency would be improved and a substantial amount of money would be saved, which is important for a Department that's always struggling for funding.

Of course this won't happen, because Accreditation was never about bettering the Agency. It's about padding resumes for the handful of people at the top involved with it, and it's about earning clout within the IACP, presumably help set certain individuals up for their next jobs after EHPD. That's why they don't care about how the Department is actually running on the ground floor, so long as they can slap a CALEA sticker on it and say "look what I did" before they walk away, all at the taxpayer's expense.