Now that former Congresswoman Karen Bass has taken over as the Mayor of Los Angeles, she has plenty of work in front of her. One job will be to get the crime rate under control, a promise her opponent in the race also vowed to do. That job has been made even more challenging by the fact that the LAPD has been losing police officers at an alarming rate. So Bass has now announced a plan to “rebuild” the police force through a program of incentives and “lifting barriers” to recruitment. What could possibly go wrong? (L.A. Times)
The LAPD is hemorrhaging officers, with more leaving the force than are joining it. Police Chief Michel Moore reported last week that sworn staffing had fallen to 9,103, down nearly 1,000 from 2019, the year that preceded the outbreak of COVID-19.
Mayor Karen Bass is looking to confront the issue head on by ramping up hiring and lifting barriers to recruitment. Her proposed budget, which will be released Tuesday, will call for the city to restore the department to 9,500 officers — an extremely tall order, given the ongoing staff exodus.
“I know that that is ambitious, but I think it needs to happen.” she said.
A full decade ago, L.A. had more than 10,000 police officers. Now they are on the verge of falling below 9,000. So Bass has, to her credit, identified a very real problem and come up with a proposal to address it. But she’s already receiving pushback from her own base over this. A group called La Defensa is urging her to “take advantage” of the police departures by replacing those officers with unarmed “interventionists” would could be sent to investigate reports of suspects displaying possible mental health issues.
Members of the City Council are also opposing the plan. One member said she would prefer to “replace” the LAPD with a “much smaller armed force.” The gangs must be loving this.
But the police academy classes are currently at lesss than half of their total capacity for applicants most of the time. The LAPD expects to lose at least another thousand officers this year to retirements and resignations. The goal that Bass has set forth may be impossible. And what did she mean by saying she would “lift barriers” to recruitment? The only “barriers” are the standards one must meet to apply. Does she propose lowering those standards until they find enough recruits? That can’t possibly end well.
If Mayor Bass really wants this plan to succeed, she’s approaching it from the wrong angle. Let’s try to put this in a way that even a politician should be able to understand. When your bucket of water has a hole in it, you don’t try to pour water into it more quickly. You patch the hole.
Address the reasons why so many police officers are opting for early retirement or simply quitting. Begin supporting the police fully and fighting for the funding they need. Publicly distance yourself from the progressives who continue to push to reduce the police force and cast aspersions on the officers. If she can manage to do that and sustain that position, more officers might decide to stick around and give her a chance while more aspiring, qualified candidates might take the plunge. Failure to do so will push L.A. further and further toward being a failed city.
