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BPD goals: More walking beats and tweets

Ed DavisBoston Police Commissioner Ed Davis yesterday set out his goals for the coming year, which include a 10% reduction in major crime, a 25% increase in walking and bicycle beats and a new "Tweet from the Beat" program for police supervisors on those beats.

Davis pointed to a 25% decrease in crime over the past five years and some specific examples of successful large-scale operations over the past year, including the peaceful end of Occupy Boston's encampment in Dewey Square, the aftermath of the Back Bay transformer fire and the Bruins' Stanley Cup win:

When the Bruins won the Stanley Cup last year after a 39 year drought, your thoughtful and strategic planning, extensive experience in crowd control, and methodical execution resulted in a wonderful celebration for fans in the city that evening. What a stark contrast to what has happened in other cities in similar situations.

But police can do more, he said:

We have made great progress in crime reduction over the last 5 years. With that I firmly believe that as individuals and as a department we are capable of doing more. That's why I have set an aggressive goal of a 10% reduction in overall crime for this year.

A key part of that, he said, is getting cops out from behind the wheels of their cruisers:

We are continuing our ongoing commitment to community policing. Last year we successfully completed 160,000 walking and bicycle beats. The positive feedback from the community and the results were significant and encouraging, demonstrating that COPS MATTER. This year I want us to reach 200,000. ... It is ambitious but I know that you are up to the challenge. I want to see everyone out of cars and walking for some portion of their shift. It has already made a difference in how the community sees us and how safe they feel in their neighborhoods.

To further that effort the Bureau of Investigative Services has also taken great strides in community engagement. Through their new outreach program, detectives are working with local businesses and residents to develop positive relationships outside of their investigative duties. This means Detectives are getting out and walking the beat. They're visiting and talking to community members, attending community meetings and educating the public on safety tips and the importance of community input to solving crimes.

He said BPD will expand its efforts to reach new communities via social media:

To further enhance our external communication, the department is launching a new social media program titled: Tweet from the Beat. It is a way to combine the BPD's community policing philosophy with the department's advances in social media. The program consists of participating Command Staff utilizing the existing Boston Police twitter account to communicate with community members via 'tweets' during the course of assigned walking beats throughout identified communities.

Davis said another goal is legislation that would let Boston Police patrol the waterfront areas of South Boston. The land is now under jurisdiction of Massport and State Police, which has led to friction with BPD now that a growing percentage of it is being used for housing and commercial space rather than simply port facilities.

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Comments

...What's a "beat" in this context?

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BPD logs every instance of an officer spending time walking around (as opposed to driving around) his beat. If you listen to BPD on a scanner, you'll hear officers telling their dispatcher things like "Take me off on a Code 19 at Dewey Square," which is BPDspeak for "I'll be walking around Dewey Square."

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Mumbles 1Million Lb. march maybe old Ed could pull a few code 19's

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Code 19s don't necessarily mean a walking beat is going on. 50% of the time it means a cop is sitting in his cruiser in front of that location. (the other 50% of the time he is walking in the location to go to the bathroom or get something to eat!)

A true wailing beat is assigning a cop to a specific route withou a vehicle. That cop is dropped off there, or rides there on his bike. That cop would then walk around or bike around his sector without the ability to drive anywhere.

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No snark from this corner today. Walking (or bike) beats are good, it humanizes the police in a way the cruisers can't. This is good news.

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It also prevents the cop from quickly responding to a call. When someone is trying to break in to your house, do you want the cops to come racing through the neighborhood to get there, or do you want then walking up the street ten blocks away?

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why does it have to be either or?

Under your scenario you seem to SOL if they were on another call in the first place.

As far as I'm concerned there's nothing keeping LEO's from walking a beat and being dispatched to the non-emergency stuff and community building while the cruisers take care of the quick response stuff.

Unless the department is woefully understaffed and pretty much only staffed for reactionary policing.

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BPD has far less personnel now than they did in the 1950s. You know - before the rise of drug crime, when you could count the number of homicides each year on a few hands.

Cops were not put in to cruisers as a perverse effort to not do their jobs. They were put into cruisers to get from here to there faster. When calls are coming in constantly, there's no time to chew the fat with Mrs McGillicuddy.

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Literalism.

Cripes

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Mounted police (police on horseback) are just as affective, if not more affective than police in a cruiser, not only because they can get to a burglary or assault scene just as fast, if not faster, but, since a mounted policeman/policewoman is much higher above the street than police in a cruiser, they can see many more things that're going on, from a distance.

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This is an impossible task when the majority of time spent on the clock is working details not policing.

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If the police don't guard manholes during utility work then the CHUDS might escape and wreak havoc upon our fair city. You don't want that do you?

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You keep jumping on the wrong site. The site above is what you're looking for.

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Yesterday I walked by two sites where three of Boston's finest were paid time and half by NStar at one site and National Grid at another. Those monies of course are actually paid anyone who pays for gas and electricity in the area. So my electric and gas charges include payments to Boston's uniform fetishists so that they can demonstrate their detail prowess at doing nothing.

If the details were adding value then the details would be tolerable. There is the occasional arrest but the overall addition of value is near zero. The same applies to the firefighters who expect detail assignments. Recently I saw posted a building permit for some construction work that explicitly stated that the firefighters detail would be conducted in the form of an unnecessary inspection.

For all the complaints about the cost of living in Boston here is one instance where the cost could be lessoned.

At least the average Boston citizen can be grateful that teachers, janitors and anyone else employeed by the city is not granted the favoritism given to the BPD and BFD.

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A fire detail is actually quite necessary on construction jobs. Many constuction projects are rehab projects using new steel beams along with preserving old wood beams. The molten steel from cutting and welding drips into small voids and often times down several floors. Wood used for construction or temporary partitioning, plastic wire insulation along with trash (The Herald, Dunkies cups, sandwich wrappers) sometimes catch and small fires do occur. When small fires aren't put out they turn into big fires (think Mandarin Oriental). Even if it's just a small fire, most work would be shut down for at least the day, sending X amount of workers home. So maybe paying a firefighter, with a 2-way radio and an extinguisher, $32 an hour to monitor the site could actually be saving money in the long run.

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And see if they actually do nothing or not. Many cops are worthless and do nothing when work needs to be done, and Boston cops are worse in general when it comes to details than other towns ( ask any utility worker) Sometimes people cross and another human being has to physically stop cars so that person can cross. Many detail officers are now encouraged or allowed to do traffic enforcement if they are waiting for an actual job to do. This can pay for the detail itself in two citations. Troopers can do this on their way to and from a detail.

And you the gas payer also pays for the pensionable overtime that NYC union workers get on national grid work as well. The city of Boston also collects a surcharge on every detail hour worked and makes a few hundred thousand bucks a year on those surcharges.

If you do what NYC or Baltimore does (separate traffic units for traffic control), you basically create another beau racy with more benefits, unions, pensions, workers comp, etc. And NYC and Baltimore still have cops do road details in many areas, some places that OT is more than here and pensionable! Long story short, I don't think eliminating details will save anyone any money in the short or long term.

It is far from a perfect system, and there is a lot of abuse, but the cost issue is overstated for your average taxpayer.

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isn't paying detail officers, the companies using them are. They're also not "on duty", but like any LEO they still have powers when off duty and can use them.

So, stop spreading FUD. If you want to get rid of the stupid practice of forcing expensive detail work, stop pedaling FUBAR. It undercuts your argument.

Hell, here's a solution. Force the clubs in Boston to pay for 1 detailed officer per 75 patrons, while allowing flag wavers / civilian details. Seems like a smart reallocation of resources to me.

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