In the coming months, each district will have a LIDAR gun, which trains a laser beam on a car to determine its exact speed.
The new plan -- which also includes a unit that will deploy officers to traffic trouble spots across the city -- comes just months after a parade of aldermen complained that pedestrian safety and enforcement of the city's traffic laws were not priorities of the department.
On Tuesday, Transportation Committee Chair Tom Allen (38th) said the new plan fell short in one key way: The city doesn't just need new gadgets but more officers to use them.
we're not hiring any new police. I still feel the money should be devoted to police.''
I’m sure we can all agree that traffic enforcement at the district level is minimal at best. Districts citywide are having a hard time manning all their cars. We constantly find ourselves working in a backlog with stacked jobs in the box. When a traffic stop is done its usually because some idiot blatantly commited a violation right in front of the copper. Alderman Allen hit the nail on the head when he said “the city doesn’t just need new gadgets but more officers to use them”
We noticed on the latest transfer order that a handful of officers were going to the traffic unit. Again the department is robbing Peter to pay Paul. Allen has prodded Daley for months to hire 100 more officers exclusively for traffic enforcement with funds from the red light camera tickets.
We have been to plenty of CAPS meetings where the community not only complains about crime but the lack of traffic enforcement. Now the department has created another group of officers that are to be “deployed” from 35th st. to handle a problem that should be handled at the district level. The districts are yet again being siphoned of their manpower to create another “target” unit. That brings us to another subject regarding manpower but we’ll save that for another post.
3 comments:
When do I get my LIDAR???
Traffic should be a big deal. We're so focused on guns and drugs that it seems like every other law in the city isn't worth enforcing.
It's seems odd that killing a CPD officer by intenionally directing a 2500 pound object of steel and plastic filled with highly combustible fuel through a traffic controlled intersection, all while not being properly licensed by the state to operate the 2500 pound obect in the first place, is somehow less of a tragedy then if he was shot and killed by someone.
How about a "Zero tolerance " on traffic violators everytime a CPD officers is killed/injured in an accident with an unlicensed/uninsured "citizen"
Typical.......... More toys = less Cops.......
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