The mayor is right.
Some of you probably never thought you would read those words under my byline, huh?
Well, the fact of the matter is Mayor Greg Ballard is right regarding his stance on Proposal 141, which he vetoed.
But, the City-County Council is also right.
We need more police officers on the streets and we need them fast! That’s why I agree with the bi-partisan group of councilors who supported Proposal 141, which would have transferred $6 million from the Rebuild Indy fund to the Department of Public Safety “for the purpose of reimbursing the department for the expenses relating to the recruitment, hiring and training of sworn police officers and to create a new non-reverting police recruiting fund.”
However, when you think long-term, $6 million is not a lot of money – especially when you consider retaining the roughly 60 officers council members planned on hiring with the fund. Naturally we don’t just want the officers on the streets for a short time, we want to keep them on the streets and we have to continuously incentivize them. What we don’t need, is an influx of officers being laid off or quitting in a couple years’ time because there is not enough money to go toward retention efforts.
That puts a Band Aid on the problem.
We need stitches that will guarantee that the wound doesn’t resurface later on. And that, my friends, is why Mayor Ballard is right.
It is smart of Ballard to think long-term and work toward a tangible solution that makes sense across the board. I commend him on his efforts and I support his veto, but he arrived late to the dance.
Those who support Proposal 141 said the initial cost would be covered from the $6 million Rebuild Indy fund. To sustain the cost of adding the extra police, monies would need to be spent on salaries for present police officers who would be retiring. About 40 officers retire annually. What Proposal 141 would do is backfill existing positions.
When Ballard initially ran for office six years ago, he did so with the promise that public safety was a top priority for him. That promise from the former Marine seemed to really resonate with Indianapolis residents and a short time later, the man who no one believed had a shot became the big engine that could when he defeated incumbent Bart Peterson.
Once elected, Ballard’s campaign promise became a thing of the past and public safety suffered. And guess what? We’re still suffering.
I wouldn’t be so optimistic about Ballard’s plan for the future of public safety if there weren’t two entities involved that I think can actually help turn the tide of violence we’ve been seeing this year.
Those two people are Public Safety Director Troy Riggs and Police Chief Rick Hite.
I’ve had the pleasure of talking to both men extensively in recent months and I have been very impressed with their perspectives on a multitude of items. Their reasoning is logical and their approach to things is practical, deliberate and effective.
Riggs and Hite are Ballard’s two aces in the hole; his rams in the bush, if you will. Or perhaps even simpler, Riggs and Hite are Ballard’s life vest. They are the ones who (hopefully) are going to save him from what could potentially be a second-term disaster; as if the whole cricket debacle isn’t enough.
I trust Riggs and Hite and I am confident that together, they can come up with a cohesive plan that everyone can support. However, to get such unified support, there has to be dialogue between Riggs, Hite, Ballard and members of the City-County-Council – specifically Vernon Brown who sponsored the proposal and Council President Maggie Lewis who supported it. This is a wonderful opportunity for the mayor and his team to put politics aside and conduct business in a way that is ultimately good for all Marion County residents. This is the opportune time for Ballard to separate politics and his individual feelings–or lack thereof–for people he doesn’t generally agree with, for the greater good of everyone.
A few months ago, I wrote about my ride-along experience with officers from the North District. This district oversees some of the most dangerous areas in the city. What I know from my conversations with those men and women who put their lives on the line everyday is that they could care less about politics. All they want is to do their jobs effectively so they can return home to their families. Part of doing their jobs effectively obviously involves getting more officers on the streets – they need back up because I saw firsthand how they are being stretched entirely too thin.
I encourage Riggs and Hite and all the other players, who need to be at the table in search of a tangible solution to the public safety problem, to first consider the officers who are currently protecting our streets. They must then consider the citizens of Marion County who are and will continue to be victims of thugs and criminals committing these violent acts.
Put partisan politics aside, work to make the streets safer and more efficient and get present, real solutions that can be implemented immediately, yet supported long-term.
You can email comments to Shannon Williams at shannonw@indyrecorder.com.
