I was a Baltimore City Police Officer. I graduated from the Academy on October 31, 1969 and served in Operations at the Eastern District
under then Sgt. Destefano. (Ret Major Destefano). I also served 4 years active duty in the military and 28 years in the reserve, retiring as a Marine Transportation Officer. I am a strong supporter of the Police and have contributed regularly to FOP Lodge #3 and other police organizations. I want the department to be fully staffed, well trained, and well equipped. The men and women on the street deserve all of the support that they need to do the most important job in our city government. I think that politicians should stick to politics
and police should be allowed to be police.

1. Better pay. We should be recruiting the best and brightest and retaining our experienced, veteran officers. Pay for the City Police Officer must be the highest in the state to attract the best candidates. No other municipality has a more dangerous or difficult working environment. Commit the Department to a recruiting Campaign that challenges candidates to focuses on commitment, honor and
selfless service community - let highest pay in State be a comment but not the entire feature. Recruit on a physically and mentally
competitive basis.

2. Take the politics out of the police department. Politicians should monitor the police budget and set general policy directives. Cops
should be cops. Another reason for our chronic staffing problem has been the lack of consistent management and the politicization of the department. I have spent more than half of my life wearing a uniform. Uniformed officers respond best to a defined chain of command and a hierarchy. We have had extraordinary turnover in the middle ranks of police command.

3. Restore civil service protection for middle management. During the Schmoke administration, Baltimore began to phase out the rank of Captain, which is protected by civil service. Captains used to be the Chief Operating Officers of the districts, while the Major dealt with departmental politics and bureaucracy. During the O'Malley administration, the position of Deputy Major was created to fill the void created by the abolition of Captains. This position serves at the discretion of the Commissioner. Thus, an essential command position has been moved from the merit system to a system that is subject to internal politicking. This is indicative of what has been happening to the Police Department across the board. When there is turmoil at the top of a para-military organization, it quickly works its way down to the rank and file.

4. Stop promising miracles. There is no "silver bullet." Anyone who tells you that he or she has a magic formula for reducing crime is
being disingenuous. Crime is caused by a mixture of economic, educational and societal factors. If people have jobs, they establish
stable residences. Their families remain intact, their kids do better in school, and the community as a whole is less susceptible to
criminal activity. All of the major challenges of city government work together to affect the crime rate.

5. Let the police do what works best, without interference. During the early years of the Norris administration the Warrant Apprehension Task Force seemed to be the most effective tool for preventing violent crime. In recent years, the police department followed political pressures and started following a "flavor of the month" formula of management that has been driven by politics, not professional policing techniques.

6. Use technology to track repeat offenders. The experts will tell you that there are probably 3,000 extremely violent, repeat offenders
in the city at any given time. Baltimore's criminal justice system needs to adopt a triage process that identifies these violent offenders and works them harder than the rest of the criminal community. Rhetoric about "zero tolerance" is great for speechmaking, but on the streets there is a fairly common continuum of activity that leads an offender to violent crime. I would like to see police, prosecutors, and probation officials use the Compstat system to identify offenders who are on a trajectory leading to violent crime. Once these offenders are identified, they should get an electronic"red flag" that leads to enhanced monitoring and intervention. Almost all violent offenders are frequent participants in the court system. Too many of them slip through the cracks.

For example, the man accused of killing Officer Chesley in West Baltimore had two pending gun charges at the time of the murder. In
an ideal world, the second charge should have triggered a request that his bail be revoked. If this had been done, Officer Chesley would be alive today and the accused killer wouldn't be looking at a life sentence without parole. I would rather see resources used to hunt
down potential killers than having police sweep the streets arresting people for minor offenses.

Use of this technology would ideally be coordinated between the police and State's Attorney. Funding would be provided by the City Council through the budget process.

7. Incumbent Jim Kraft has been bad for public safety. My position on policing and law enforcement differs greatly from incumbent
Councilman Jim Kraft's. Councilman Kraft is Chairman of the Committee on Judiciary and Legislative Investigations and Co-Chair of
the Subcommittee on Public Safety. When he first took office, the Police Department was fully staffed and its salaries were almost as
good as surrounding jurisdictions. On his watch, salaries lagged behind the surrounding counties and vacancies skyrocketed. Although
the Police Department now admits to 160 vacancies, the real number is more like 300. If you want to hire the best, and retain the best, you have to pay the best. That is the City Council's job.

Councilman Kraft is a criminal defense attorney with a long history of fighting against law enforcement personnel. He has used his committee chairmanship as a "bully pulpit" to attack the State's Attorney. He did the same thing in Howard County, where he spent most of his professional life. In that county, he used his position as President of a Democratic Club to repeatedly attack former State's Attorney
Marna McClendon. He has done the same in Baltimore City with his frequent attacks against State's Attorney Jessamy.

The system will not work well, however, until the grandstanding and politics takes a back seat to reasoned analysis. The incumbent in my district has been a champion grandstander when it comes to criminal justice issues. His treatment of Ms. Jessamy has not elevated the public debate on law enforcement. I am not a speechmaker. I want to analyze the numbers and respond on a well-reasoned basis.











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