I disagree with having a separate park police force. I see it as being akin to a small town of 500 people maintaining it's own police force when they could for less money contract with the county to have a deputy serve their community.
For those that maintain our parks will go down the crapper without them, how? Are St. Paul's parks a bastion of crime? So horrible that it's citizens stay far, far away from them? Maybe having numbers will show that St. Paul parks experience 4.5% more violent crimes than Minneapolis parks. Would that justify the millions of extra dollars the city spends merely to have it's own park? Personally, I lived at 28th and Lyndale Ave N. or Philips, I would be livid that the city could find a few million dollars to have some cops drive up and down the parkways while I had to keep my TV in the basement to make it more difficult to steal or to make things a bit more safe while watching it in case of a stray bullet or three. Allen Graetz Lowry Hill -----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Tuesday, January 11, 2005 11:25 PM To: [email protected] Subject: [Mpls] Park Police /duplication of services Aaron Klemz asked:" can someone explain what the benefit is to having an independent Park Police? " I think it is a similar question to why don't we just have State Police. All Minnesota Police could all have the same uniforms, all drive the same cars and all have the same administration............ It would be really helpful to have a conversation about this that wasn't just an argument that was based on overly broad or unproven assumptions. The lack of any actual numbers or careful analysis of the very different kind of jobs that are done really hurts the possibility of an informed decision. I have some opinions from personal experience that might be helpful in providing some context, but I am also trying to get more information from Chief Brad Johnson to add to this discussion. The parks are statistically safer than the rest of the city. Why is that? There are a variety of reasons but certainly part of that is that there are Park Police who focus on Parks. Kids, cops, and community policing. Community policing is proactive problem solving that involves the community. In a totally over broad generalization, the administration and conduct of the Minneapolis Police Department is basically antithetical to community oriented policing. The separate police force that was supposed to do community oriented policing, CCP/Safe has marginalizes any change in the MPD and even that is disappearing. The Seward neighborhood is putting a restorative justice program together. We met with Sgt. Gross from the MPD and Chief Brad Johnson from the MPRB to get police officers to use their discretion to give juveniles a choice of receiving a citation or having the option of going through a restorative justice program. Chief Johnson said he would talk to the officers that work the area and have them do this and have the Park Director help out as well. Sgt. Gross said it was a great idea but he didn't have a structure to have any officers buy in to this program. The Park Police have the capability to solve problems before they get worse and work with the community to identify problems before they become criminal problems. The MPD is more of a paramilitary structure designed to respond to crimes that have been already committed. So I really don't see this as duplication of services. I see these as different police forces with different missions. The Park Police are the only Neighborhood Police we have in uniform and I am glad the are there and they have an administration that supports these efforts. I think Joan Berthiaume had a good idea -maybe we should call the Park Police- Park Rangers to help clarify their different mission. Thanks, Scott Vreeland Seward To my friends at CPED, you folks work hard and I respect you and your work even when we don't agree. REMINDERS: 1. Think a member has violated the rules? Email the list manager at [EMAIL PROTECTED] before continuing it on the list. 2. Don't feed the troll! Ignore obvious flame-bait. For state and national discussions see: http://e-democracy.org/discuss.html For external forums, see: http://e-democracy.org/mninteract ________________________________ Minneapolis Issues Forum - A City-focused Civic Discussion - Mn E-Democracy Post messages to: mailto:[email protected] Subscribe, Un-subscribe, etc. at: http://e-democracy.org/mpls REMINDERS: 1. Think a member has violated the rules? Email the list manager at [EMAIL PROTECTED] before continuing it on the list. 2. Don't feed the troll! Ignore obvious flame-bait. For state and national discussions see: http://e-democracy.org/discuss.html For external forums, see: http://e-democracy.org/mninteract ________________________________ Minneapolis Issues Forum - A City-focused Civic Discussion - Mn E-Democracy Post messages to: mailto:[email protected] Subscribe, Un-subscribe, etc. at: http://e-democracy.org/mpls
