Here is Part 2 of my post on the 8/20 PFC meeting. Freedom of Expression Resolution. In the spring, the Common Council, on a 5-2 vote, passed a resolution re-affirming rights of free expression. The resolution was reviewed, but not adopted at the August PFC meeting. The reception – but not adoption – offers insight…
Police
City, Police, Uncategorized
Police and Fire Commission — Last Meeting, 8/20/08 (Part 1)
by JOHN ADAMS •
I’ll post now on the latest Police and Fire Commission Meeting, from August, as a prelude to a week-ending series of posts on the constitutional lawsuit against Meyer and the City of Whitewater. I will devote Saturday to that series on the lawsuit, and what it so clearly tells about our leadership and politics. (FREE…
City, Free Markets, Libertarians, Police
The Different Standard
by JOHN ADAMS •
Sometimes a story about one topic reveals more about another. In Pewaukee, there have been chronic concerns about the temperament and conduct of that community’s police chief. In early August, the Pewaukee City Council requested that the city’s Police and Fire Commission remove police chief Gary Bach from office. Among the Common Council’s charges against…
City, Police
Where’s Whitewater’s M56 Scorpion Anti-Tank Weapon?
by JOHN ADAMS •
Police, Press, Register Watch™
Register Watch™ for October 2nd: Patrol Cars
by JOHN ADAMS •
On the back page of the paper is a brief, unattributed story entitled, “Whitewater police patrol cars are sporting two new additions.” On Media Relations. There’s a false theory that says that if you repeat the same information enough times, people will believe what you’ve said, regardless of how erroneous it might be. It’s…
Police
The Dangerous Paramilitary Direction
by JOHN ADAMS •
I am a blogger from Whitewater, Wisconsin, a small town of fourteen thousand in America’s Dairyland. There is, thankfully, no large and organized local threat against our city, or thousands of other cities in rural America. We are far from America’s fanatical foreign enemies. Richland County, South Carolina is far away, too. It’s not so…
Police
Wisconsin as a (Library) Police State
by JOHN ADAMS •
The Smoking Gun website reports that twenty year old Heidi Dalibor was arrested, handcuffed, and photographed for a mug shot because she had two long overdue books from the Grafton, Wisconsin library. It’s nearly funny until you consider that arrest over two library books is an absurd waste of police time and effort. A serious…
Police
The Police and Fire Commission Meeting for August 20, Part 5
by JOHN ADAMS •
5. Why not televise? Months ago, I came out against televised PFC meetings, on the theory that television would inhibit complaints. It was a faint hope. Candidly, it’s the reputation of leadership that makes reliance on any supposedly confidential process dubious. I’ll ask a question: Have police leaders ever sat in on citizen-commissioner interviews of…
Police
The Police and Fire Commission Meeting for August 20, Part 4
by JOHN ADAMS •
4. Why so few meetings? If one looks at the schedule of PFC meetings, they meet regularly – if they do – only quarterly. Many other Commissions meet more frequently. Is their work more important? Notes from one meeting are not approved until the next – an entire season goes by before they are approved.…
Police
The Police and Fire Commission Meeting for August 20, Part 3
by JOHN ADAMS •
3. City Manager’s Oversight? Our small city has a council-manager form of government, and the appointed city manager is Kevin Brunner. On the City of Whitewater website, the city lists the dozens of functions of the city manager. Among that number one sees that he claims oversight of the Police and Fire Commission. Should that…
Police
The Police and Fire Commission Meeting for August 20, Part 2
by JOHN ADAMS •
Police
The Police and Fire Commission Meeting for August 20, Part 1
by JOHN ADAMS •
Whitewater’s Police and Fire Commission will meet tonight. Here’s the first of some quick questions. 1. Who prepares the agenda? By Wisconsin statute, the PFC oversees the police department, not the other way around. One who drafts a meeting agenda typically controls the meeting. The current PFC agenda, like others before it, says that it…
Police
Something’s Rotten about Policing in the State of Maryland, and Elsewhere
by JOHN ADAMS •
I’ve written about what’s rotten in the state of Maryland before: a tradition of spying or intimidating political critics. It’s a problem that began under former Democratic governor William Schaefer, and apparently resumed under former Republican governor Bob Ehrlich. There’s more trouble in that troubled state: an apparent pattern of excessive force, sometimes wholly mistaken,…
Police, Uncategorized
Police Accreditation in the June 26th Register
by JOHN ADAMS •
I recently offered an assessment of the accreditation of our police department. My post from June 17 on the subject is available on my website. I noted four deficiencies with accreditation. First, accreditation is a self-selected status, and does not test or measure all departments in the state. Second, a list of several hundred standards…