A second chance to renew L.A. County probation

On Tuesday we will learn whether the Board of Supervisors has the guts to establish discipline and restore integrity at the county Probation Department, where corruption apparently has become the norm. Three months ago, the board hired Donald H. Blevins, the former head of Alameda County’s probation department, to take the helm, and installed Cal Remington, who had been the interim chief, as his No. 2. Both men are respected in the field, and expectations are high that their leadership will result in a rehabilitated department. With a vote scheduled for Tuesday, the supervisors should give Blevins the power he has requested to hire a small number of managers from outside the department, without regard for civil service regulations. Permitting him to impose a new regime from the top is one way to help his vision prevail.

This is the board’s second go-round with what is a common-sense proposal. Two members of the board were absent when the issue arose last week and Supervisor Mark Ridley-Thomas abstained, asserting that all five supervisors should be present for such an important decision. The next day he publicly declared that he had no faith in the county’s ability to turn the department around and called for the U.S. Justice Department to step in. In an opinion article in the Huffington Post, Ridley-Thomas wrote, “The problems at probation are too great to drop at the feet of a new manager alone .... The county has been trying for years to right this troubled department. Enough time has passed, without enough progress, that it’s time to give the department’s leaders new, more powerful tools to do their job.”

Ridley-Thomas then went on to describe the extensive problems with probation and how they seem to reach into virtually every aspect of the department: physical and sexual abuse by staff of the very young people the department is supposed to be supervising; a broken internal affairs department; financial mismanagement to the tune of $79 million; and, most recently, the discovery that staff had used credit cards issued to the county to buy PlayStations, large-screen televisions and other such toys for their own use. Unfortunately, not a word he wrote of the department’s difficulties can be challenged.

But does previous failure absolve the county from an obligation to press for improvement? Ridley-Thomas was right that Blevins needs the tools to perform the job, but he asks the feds to supply them. At this point we would like to see the county do so. Because the question isn’t just whether the Probation Department can be reformed, but also how committed the county is to seeing that process through.