Pomona : Police Group Backs Recall

The state Peace Officers Research Assn. of California, which represents 33,000 law-enforcement officers, has joined the campaign to recall Councilman C. L. (Clay) Bryant, citing his participation in the firing of Pomona’s police chief and his remarks about police officers.

Larry Malmberg, association president, handed the City Council a resolution this week that accused the council of having “publicly ridiculed, intimidated and badgered” police officers.

The resolution alluded to Bryant’s disclosure that the president of the Pomona Police Officers Assn. had received psychiatric care and to Mayor Donna Smith’s claim that the council fired Richard Tefank as police chief in October over her objection because he would not dismiss subordinates without cause.

Bryant dismissed the state police association as a Sacramento lobbying group, which, he said, spends its time figuring out “outlandish ways of bilking the taxpayers out of more money for the police departments.”