Irvine Officers Ready to Put Chief to Confidence Vote

The city’s police officers, complaining of a lack of a leadership in their department amid stalled contract talks and the cloud of a sex-discrimination lawsuit, are preparing a vote of “confidence” in their chief, according to a confidential memorandum circulated at their headquarters.

In the memo, the Irvine Police Assn. board of directors demands that Chief Charles S. Brobeck appear before it at a meeting that has been set for this afternoon to answer 36 pointed questions and indicates that a confidence vote will follow if board members find his responses unsatisfactory. The officers group has also invited City Manager Paul O. Brady Jr. to the meeting.

Disclosure of the memo, dated Jan. 22, comes a day after a sex-discrimination lawsuit was filed by four current and former female employees of the department, including two active-duty officers.

Questions raised in the memo compare the chief to an “absentee landlord” and accuse him of using a city gasoline credit card inappropriately, asking department employees to polish his personal car, and being oblivious to “terrible morale” within the department.

Brobeck said in an interview at City Hall on Wednesday that he has prepared a six-page response to the officers’ questions, which he described as largely “inaccurate” and blamed on their “frustration” with stalled contract talks.

The chief said he was told that only 15 of the 128 employees of his department submitted questions for the memo, and he declared that many of his officers had “reassured” him of their support.

“They’ve been working without a contract for a year and a half, and there’s a lot of ill feelings among the force about that,” Brobeck said.

The chief said officers have told him of their chagrin at the release of the memo.

“Someone violated a family trust when they faxed it to the press,” Brobeck said. “And that hurt.”

Police Lt. Patrick Rogers, who works closely with the chief but is also president of the officers association, said questions in the memo were purposefully unedited when posted.

“The questions were typed up the way they were received from members,” Rogers said. “They weren’t watered down. Some are factual, some may not be. There are perceptions, misperceptions and miscommunications.

“I knew there were some inaccuracies, and I could have prevented them from being listed. But when I wear my association hat, I work for the membership.”

Rogers, the chief, two supervisors and the city are defendants in the sex-discrimination lawsuit filed by four women. Irvine’s mayor, city manager and city attorney declined to comment on the lawsuit Wednesday. The police chief also declined to comment, except to call the suit “disruptive.”

The police association memorandum deals with several intradepartmental matters such as the rotation of personnel among plum jobs, staffing levels and training. Some questions, such as No. 10, express anger toward Brobeck: “The city tells us that it doesn’t have any money to resolve the contract. Yet you are constantly traveling at the city’s expense all over the state. How can you justify this type of expenditure?”

Another question contends that Technical Services personnel cleaned and polished his personal car and asks whether he is “above” filling his tank at department pumps “like the rest of us”--instead using a city-issued gas card at retail pumps.

Brobeck, who was hired last year from Novato, Calif., dismissed the claims as inaccurate, saying his friction with some officers stems from a “cultural change” at the department.

“I am different than the previous chief--how do I say it graciously? I get out of headquarters a lot and spend time in the community,” he said. “Change causes anxiety and turmoil. But we’re going to ride this out.”

Following disclosure of the memorandum, Brobeck issued a confidential note of his own to the department on Wednesday, instructing police employees “not to communicate” with the press regarding the sex-discrimination lawsuit so as to “not increase the spread of rumors.”

Irvine police were apparently heeding that advice, but Bino Hernandez, a retired Los Angeles police sergeant now representing officers in legal cases, says he believes that Brobeck is out of line in his attempt to quiet employees.

“If they have no fear of the truth, why should he intimidate their claims?” Hernandez said. “One of the basic freedoms we have is a freedom of speech--and I don’t believe police officers should be second-class citizens who are deprived of that right.”