In 1976, the Culver City Police Dept. hired 8 new police officers, bringing its total number of sworn police officers to 67.
Here is what the organizational charts looked like in 1976 with 67 police officers and at its high point in 2003 with 128 police officers.
1976
One Police Chief
2 police captains
4 lieutenants
8 sergeants
52 police officers
2003
One Police Chief
One Assistant Police Chief
3 police captains
18 police lieutenants
23 sergeants
82 police officers
By outward appearances, it would seem the streets are safer in Culver City because of the doubling of the police force in the last 30 years.
Unless you know Culver City’s dirty little secret that only the police officers, city management, City Council and local criminals know.
As night falls on sleepy little Culver City, the residents return to their homes, some businesses close, others ready for the nighttime influx of business and criminals come out to utilize their best asset: the cover of darkness.
What happens at the Police Dept. is this little secret:
Most police officers go home.
When I started in 1976, we had more police officers patrolling the streets at night than at any other time before or since.
Are We Safer Now?
In the 1980s as a patrol sergeant and the 1990s and 2000s as a patrol lieutenant, I had to deal with a lack of manpower in patrol during nighttime hours.
The question has to be:
Have all of these management positions made the streets of Culver City safer at night?
The true answer is “no.”
In the past 32 years, all of these positions were presented to the community as an increase in the number of police officers on the street in order to keep the city safer.
Each time the utility user’s tax was increased, it was to save these positions to keep the streets safer. Each time the City Council speaks on this matter, their message is, “We will not cut vital police services to the community.”
They can’t cut the vital police services because they cut those vital nighttime police officers on the street 25 years ago, and they never replaced them.
Why were these numerous management positions created and maintained for all of these years? City Hall will tell you it is to maintain public safety.
I can make a better case for increasing the number of Captains from 2 to 3 n and an Assistant Chief.
It is the perfect number for a foursome on the golf course.
Why increase the lieutenants from 4 to18?
Choosing Sides
I could make the case that 14 is a good number for a traveling police softball team — and you still have 4 lieutenants at home to protect public safety.
Many of the personnel filling these positions, now and in the past, have not worked a 40 hour-week in the past 25 years. Every time you try to find one of these management personnel, they are golfing, they left early, they are coming in late, they are away at a meeting or training in another county or state.
There is a saying at the Police Dept.:
The higher the rank,the harder they are to find.
City Manager Mark Scott stated at a recent City Council meeting that they were going make cuts at the top to protect the positions at the bottom that deliver the services to the community.
Also the Police Chief stated that he would never cut positions that would jeopardize public safety.
The Assistant Chief/Captain retired last week.
Everybody Is Safe?
I am sure the City Council, city management and the Police Chief will promote someone into that $300,000 per year position.
They will all tell the community how vital to public safety this promotion is, and the community will accept it.
Who can the community trust to tell the truth?
Not police management, city management or the City Council.
Neighborhood Watch member Scott Malsin seemed a lot more concerned about the nighttime gang murders and crime in the West End before he was elected to the Council and it became a safe city.
Councilmember Mehaul O’Leary asked a Culver City Police Captain in a Council meeting about crime around a local 7-11 store.
The Captain replied there was no crime around that 7-11 store. But he added that he was “probably the wrong person to ask because I do not believe there is a crime problem anywhere in Culver City.”
The 7-11 market in question is only a block away from the Council member’s business. Within the past year, his business was broken into in the middle of the night and in another incident, he was brutally assaulted by a customer at closing time in the middle of the night.
What about the city contractor murdered at the city’s Fire Station in Fox Hills at night one year ago next week?
Ask his family what they think about the safety of Culver City and the adequacy its police protection.
You could ask current patrol officers about these things, but you might not get a true answer because they fear retaliation.
Don’t rely on what I have written now or in the past.
Every member of the community should rely on his or her own knowledge by asking yourself these questions.
Have you or someone you know ever been the victim of a crime in Culver City?
Who assisted you, a uniformed police officer or police management personnel?
If you ever had a need to contact police management, were they readily available? Or were they hard to find?
Have you ever been to a local Culver City eating or coffee establishment and seen several police officers in plain clothes or uniform gathered at one location?
Was it daytime or nighttime?
How many did I see? My guess is it would be daytime and you would see fewer officers together at night.
Mr. Smith, a retired police officer, may be contacted at scsinvest@sbcglobal.net
