If there is any group of individuals who feels under siege in this country it is police officers. They are under attack from the mayors of cities from Denver to Baltimore. The President of the United States appears actively hostile to them at times while the U.S. Department of Justice appears ever ready to take over local police departments. When a local Baltimore City State’s Attorney Marilyn Mosby declared that she will do justice for Freddie Gray by prosecuting, if not persecuting, every police officer who came in contact with him the day he died, no police officer can feel safe from a vengeful city hall.
Part of the problem police officers have is more and more videos cropping up showing what appears to be police brutality, or even worse, in some cases murder. Moreover, police trying to arrest individuals legitimately, filming their activities is both illegal and dumb. Mandatory body cameras will help diminish the filing of false charges against police officers and hopefully change the attitude and actions of the small percentage of officers who believe they are above the law.
The police across the country need to undertake a sustained public relations campaign or the hostility and animus leveled at them by many in the public will only get worse. At one time the police could count on strong support from middle class individuals, but that is all going away as the Greatest Generation dies off and the Baby Boomer Generation and those that have come after feel no such connectedness to law enforcement.
The vast number of citizens’ only contact with police is a result of traffic enforcement. If a town’s traffic enforcement is corrupt, as it is in Denver, Campo, Mountain View, Morrison, Nunn and Manzanola, then the residents of those towns and people traveling through lose respect for law enforcement. Towns with crooked traffic enforcement tend also to have crooked or at least highly suspect police and sheriff activities.
The Denver Post recently had an illuminating editorial in which it urged the state to limit the amount a town’s budget can come from traffic enforcement to 20 percent. Each of the towns listed above would be drastically affected by the proposed law with of course the exception of Denver whose corrupt traffic enforcement was not addressed or noted in the editorial.
The city of Glendale was once the town in Colorado most noted for its corrupt traffic enforcement. When the town was formally incorporated in 1952 it had little town revenues. To bring in money the mayor would get into his Cadillac with some members of the city council and head out to Colorado Boulevard and Leetsdale Drive in search of innocent motorists. When the mayor spotted what he considered a traffic violation he would put a light on top of the roof and hunt down and ticket the motorist.
Over the years Glendale became rich with the coming of Target and other big boxes as well as many bars and restaurants along East Virginia Avenue. Its police force grew and grew but exploiting motorists along Colorado Boulevard and Leetsdale Drive continued on unabated. The police force also became known for its brutality, as a cross look to a police officer on Saturday night on East Virginia could end up in a beating.
When the Glendale Tea Party took over City Hall in 1998 they tried to put a stop to the corrupt traffic enforcement and excessive police brutality but it was not easy. They undertook a study that showed the traffic enforcement regimen actually cost money after the price of police time and administrative overhead, including the salary of the municipal judge, were factored in. The police chief balked, along with the municipal judge, at any changes. Eventually the city canned the police chief when he was overheard saying that a beating of a suspect was good for police morale and the municipal judge quit as his salary was cut. Today, you have to almost try to get a ticket in Glendale as most normal traffic violators are given just a warning unless the vehicular conduct is truly egregious. Colorado Boulevard and Leetsdale Drive are safer places to travel because of it and the police brutality has disappeared.
But don’t tell Denver. Its police officers routinely set up speed traps all over the city including along University Boulevard and Leetsdale Drive where the posted limit is far slower than a motorist would expect. Moreover, as the Denver City Auditor declared in his comprehensive report on photo radar, the only real purpose for the program appeared to be to generate money for the city. The corrupt traffic enforcement accompanies, as it did in Glendale, excessive brutality cases at the Denver jail and on the streets costing millions in lawsuits by Denver residents. When police officers see that their job is not simply to “Serve and Protect” but “Abuse and Exploit” it affects their attitude in all aspects of their job.
The Denver Mayor and City Council under the absolute control of real estate developers don’t make any money off the police so they by and large don’t care what is happening. But the rest of the state is getting sick of it. In this last legislative session, best remembered for partisan gridlock with a divided legislature, two competing bills passed in a year aimed at Denver.
H.B. 1098 bans photo radar enforcement and red light cameras altogether while S.B. 276 requires a citizens’ vote and strips federal highway funds from local governments that do not hold an election before 2017. Both bills are now on Governor Hickelooper’s desk who has stated that he “hate[s] those things [photo radar and red light cameras], everybody hates them” but he believed they saved lives. Of course he did not say why he had such a belief only that he so believed. Every study, including an independent study commissioned by the Chicago Tribune, determined the exact opposite.
The governor also declared that he believed photo radar and red light cameras should be a matter local governments should decide. By that statement he was not saying the citizens should get to decide as provided in S.B. 276, but rather the decision should be left to that elected and/or appointed official who can be bribed and bought as was the case in Chicago.
If he vetoes both bills his tepid popularity would take another substantial hit, but some say that he doesn’t really care as he is now term limited. In the end, perhaps the suggestion of Senate President Bill Cadman should prevail. He called for a statewide vote. It could be coupled in a companion vote on The Denver Post recommendation that limits revenues from traffic tickets to a percentage of a town’s budget. Imagine a state in which no city has the type of corrupt traffic enforcement policies which pollutes police agencies and the public perception of police officers. Apparently the governor can’t.
— Editorial Board