Los Angeles Police Protective League Statement on Dangerous Rise in Violent Crime

Jul 2016

Los Angeles, CA—Since 2014, violent crimes in Los Angeles are up 42 percent, aggravated assaults are up 54 percent, rapes are up 9 percent and robberies are up 35 percent. Property crime is up 17 percent. Reverting back to the time when crime in Los Angeles was of out of control is unacceptable.

What Angelenos desperately need is action to make our neighborhoods safe, and what police officers need is support to safely do their jobs, not the usual lip service from the Mayor and Police Chief telling residents things aren’t so bad.

In January, with crime surging and neighborhood police patrols shockingly sparse, the Los Angeles Police Protective League proposed a Community Policing Reset (CPR) plan calling for bold action to preserve public safety. Our call went unanswered. Instead of delivering bold action, Chief Beck and his command staff delivered a bevy of bureaucratic double-talk, excuses and statistics, but no real plan to make neighborhoods safe now.

Our Community Policing Reset (CPR) plan will put more officers on the street to fight crime, improve community relations and boost officer morale. The plan consists of three cost effective elements:

Create and deploy an easy to understand baseline patrol staffing plan to accomplish the City’s goal of responding to priority one 911 calls in seven minutes and providing 40 percent of an officer’s time for proactive community policing and problem-solving.

Fix our broken workers’ compensation system to provide the over 1,600 officers who are not street-ready the prompt medical attention they need to get them back on the streets as fast as possible.

Mandate that the over 400 police officers now assigned to perform civilian work start to perform police work.

Residents should demand action to restore safety to our streets not more bureaucratic double-talk from the Mayor and Police Chief. How much worse must things get before our leaders take action?

About the LAPPL: Formed in 1923, the Los Angeles Police Protective League (LAPPL) represents the more than 9,900 dedicated and professional sworn members of the Los Angeles Police Department. The LAPPL serves to advance the interests of LAPD officers through legislative and legal advocacy, political action and education. The LAPPL can be found on the Web at www.LAPD.com.

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