I spent a significant amount of time talking to the police in the past few weeks.
The key points I made to them were: 1. There are vastly different images of the police in the city. Most serious is the strong sense I have that they divide along racial, economic and political lines. One of my highest priorities will be to attack these issues. I'll do it without demonizing but it must be a high priority because we can't be safe is parts of the community do not have a strong relationship with the police. We spent a significant bit of time on the issue of racial profiling. 2. As someone who has been a manager in the private sector, and the chair of my union's worker participation committee, I believe strongly that the workforce is most effective is working people are part of the discussion, including goalsetting. 3. I was a reporter covering the police department when it was highly politicized. Everytime someone ran for mayor they had their chief candidate and whoever pounded the most lawnsigns got to run the department. That was one of the worst periods in the department, and the last thing I will ever do is return to that. Under no circumstances would I make any deal for who would be chief, and I wasn't asked it. Sharon made this statement and it is completely reckless and wrong. I'm very interested in hearing, both on and off list, what other issues I should be talking about with the police. R.T. Rybak www.rtformayor.com _______________________________________ Minneapolis Issues Forum - A Civil City Civic Discussion - Mn E-Democracy Post messages to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subscribe, Unsubscribe, Digest option, and more: http://e-democracy.org/mpls
