Nearly three weeks after completing the polling in a unique three-day no-confidence vote, the police union of the Culver City Police Dept. this morning issued a 1,080-word press release that emphasized two findings:
• Members voted overwhelmingly (86.5 percent) to state they have lost confidence in Don Pedersen, Chief of Police for the past four years.
• After listing an agenda of allegations against Mr. Pedersen, the union said that morale is down and he needs to be replaced.
Here is the press release.
VOTE-OF-NO-CONFIDENCE ON CHIEF OF POLICE DON PEDERSEN
The Culver City Police Officers Assn., (CCPOA), representing the Culver City Police Dept.’s officers and sergeants, has returned a vote-of-no-confidence on Chief of Police Don Pedersen’s ability to lead the department.
The balloting, which took place between June 29 and July 2, 2010, resulted in 86.5 percent (seventy-seven of eighty-nine members) of Culver City’s police officers and sergeants declaring that they had no faith in Chief Pedersen as head of the city’s police department.
Only ten association members voted to support the chief while two members abstained. This vote represents a last resort in the association’s attempts to deal with what many members consider Chief Pedersen’s lack of integrity, ineffective leadership, questionable honesty, and his apparent inability to make decisions that affect their safety, working conditions, and ability to protect the citizens of Culver City. Many officers believe that Chief Pedersen has no emotional attachment or loyalty to the department, its employees, or to the city of Culver City.
Pedersen recently completed his fourth year as police chief, after previously serving as chief of the 29-member Signal Hill Police Dept. After many officers perceived a gradual decline in morale under Pedersen’s administration, last December, the CCPOA Board of Directors asked its members to complete a survey of Chief Pedersen’s performance and that of his three member command staff. Many officers expressed a belief that because of Chief Pedersen’s predominant fear of potential civil lawsuits, combined with a desire to protect his own resume for future employment, he has restructured department policy to shield himself from liability at the expense of lower ranking employees. A central concern of the survey is that Pedersen often has failed to practice his own proclaimed elevated standards of transparency and accountability. The following are a few examples, which represent common themes from the member surveys:
• Chief Pedersen failed to report collision damage to his assigned, take-home city vehicle, then later had it taken to a private body shop for a quick, “off-the-books” repair. This is a department policy violation for which lower ranked officers would be severely disciplined. When a subordinate asked Chief Pedersen about the damage, he denied knowing about it and speculated that a young civilian employee may have caused the damage while she was refueling his car. Chief Pedersen later changed his story and said that his car was damaged while he was working out inside his gym. To date, we have not seen any evidence that the chief has properly documented his vehicle’s damage.
• Chief Pedersen interfered with a criminal investigation involving the son of a City Councilman, who coincidentally had hired him as chief. Chief Pedersen hindered the investigation, and even discouraged the case detectives from serving a search warrant aimed at recovering stolen property. After the investigator claimed interference, Chief Pedersen turned the case over to the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Dept. Sheriff’s Dept. detectives ultimately served a search warrant, at which time they recovered multiple items of stolen property and contraband. Early in the investigation, a South Bay police department had arrested the Councilman’s son, at which time they found a stolen Culver City police radio in his car. The Councilman’s son had allegedly taken the radio during a burglary at the home of another City Council member. In a highly unusual move, Chief Pedersen took it upon himself to drive to the South Bay department’s headquarters and remove from evidence the recovered stolen radio. When detectives attempted to recover the stolen property, they were told that Chief Pedersen had already checked it out of the evidence room. The detectives later confronted the chief about the location of the radio. In response, Chief Pedersen asked, “Are we on or off the record?” Pedersen then admitted that he had returned the radio to the City Council member. To our knowledge, there has been no burglary reported, investigated, or prosecuted regarding this case.
• Chief Pedersen refused to identify himself to a citizen, and then lied, denying he was the police chief, after an irate resident asked if he was the chief at the scene of a search warrant. Department policy requires all officers to provide their name and serial number when asked by any citizen. Lesser-ranked officers would be disciplined for refusing to identify themselves to citizens.
• Chief Pedersen’s apparent lack of willingness or ability to make many significant decisions affecting the organization has been an ongoing source of concern among department members, including lieutenants and captains. Chief Pedersen frequently takes months to make clear-cut decisions that could easily take far less time. He often delays or defers decision-making by assigning committees, only to re-direct the committees’ recommendations for further meetings, surveys, or analysis. Many officers have jokingly named this practice “Death-by-Committee.” He also frequently delays decisions until he has consulted with his personal attorney, who is apparently paid through a special city fund that the chief established.
• Chief Pedersen has on several occasions, either directly or through intermediaries, attempted to intimidate members of the Police Officers Assn. from participating in their union activities, such as the aforementioned vote-of-no- confidence. This illegal practice prompted the CCPOA attorney to send a cease-and-desist letter to Chief Pedersen, threatening a lawsuit and a complaint with the National Labor Relations Board. Because of an earlier intimidation move by the chief, a female detective resigned from her newly elected position on the CCPOA Board of Directors. Chief Pedersen insinuated that her likelihood of promotion might be weakened by her participation on the union board, which he described as “adversarial.”
These issues, including low officer morale and lack of confidence in the chief’s leadership, are not just problems for the members of the Culver City Police Dept. They are also troublesome for the Culver City community as a whole because they negatively affect the police department’s ability to provide citizens and business people that we are sworn to protect with the high level of public safety our community has historically enjoyed.
The solution lies not in the needs of one man, but in what is best for the organization and the community. As demonstrated by the 86.5 percent vote-of-no-confidence against Chief Don Pedersen, the Culver City Police Officers Assn. is committed to resolving this dilemma. It can only be solved by a change in leadership at the police department.
For news inquiries and updates, please visit the Culver City Police Officers Assn. website at www.culvercitypolice.com or leave a message at 310.902.9341.
