Former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is revered among Democrats.
From fundraising for Adam Schiff’s Senate run to endorsing Karen Bass for Los Angeles Mayor, Pelosi’s backing is coveted among California Democrats.
But Pelosi ally Karen Bass just made an announcement that sent shockwaves through California.
Scared Los Angelenos are learning that with their new Mayor, as with many big blue city mayors, it’s all politics all the time.
Unfortunately it’s the local residents who wind up suffering through ill-conceived policy changes.
Los Angeles Mayor’s plan to purposely dumb down the LAPD slammed as a “recipe for disaster”
Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass (D) says she is looking to remove obstacles to hiring police, especially when it comes to “ethnic groups disproportionately left out of new officer training.”
Additionally, she has pledged to throw out officers with ‘right-wing’ ties.
The mayor is moving to recruit officers to the defunded Los Angeles Police Department by hiring a third party to study why some recruits fail in hopes of eliminating some qualifications.
But her plans to diversify the police department and lower the qualifications are being called ‘dangerous’ by LAPD union leaders because some aspiring officers are simply unfit for the job.
Tom Saggau is spokesperson for the Los Angeles Police Protective League and says, “That’s just a recipe for disaster. We think lowering standards is a dangerous precedent. If you have police officers that can’t make minimum qualifications or attained minimum standards, for instance, there are recruits that have been in the academy that just can’t score the minimum requirements for a physical fitness test. One hundred is the maximum score, 50 is acceptable. There are folks that are scoring under 10. That’s just dangerous.”
Alternative responses and community policing
But it’s not just a matter of lowering standards for qualifications, there’s also a political component to the mayor’s plans.
Bass seeks to “identify, discipline, and/or terminate officers associated with right-wing domestic extremist organizations.”
In an interview with the LA Times, Bass said she wants to “consider other policing options, including ‘alternative response and community policing.”
Saggau continued, saying, “Mayor Bass sees the dire need for more officers. The question is, how do you get there? And we are totally committed and completely supportive of civilianizing positions where police officers should be doing police work and civilians should be doing civilian work.”
The moves by the mayor are happening three years after the Los Angeles City Council voted to cut the Los Angeles Police Department’s budget by $150 million during the George Floyd riots.
It’s not known if Bass will seek to increase police funding as she lowers the qualification requirements for recruits.
As crime rates soar in Los Angeles, the plan to hire more police officers is certainly welcome, but if those officers aren’t up to the job,it’s hard to see how the current sorry state of affairs for far too many of the city’s residents will improve.
Stay tuned to Blue State Blues for any updates to this ongoing story.
