Donations Appreciated but Not Received : Solicitors May Not Pass on the Funds You Think You’re Giving to the LAPD

About a month ago, Los Angeles Police Chief Willie L. Williams decided to try to tap the public’s largess with a $4.5-million wish list of items that his charges need to fight crime. Fat chance in the middle of the holiday season and a recession, right?

Wrong. It turns out that licensed telephone solicitors have raised that much and perhaps more over the past year by asking people to donate money for the LAPD. But this is not a good news story; it’s a maddening one. The Los Angeles Police Department does not solicit funds by telephone, and it has not received one dime of the funds that have been raised by such groups to date.

California is home to an entirely legal and unregulated industry of 165 commercial fund-raising organizations. According to state Atty. Gen. Daniel Lungren, such groups give an average of just 30% of the money they raise to the charitable groups they are supposedly working for. Now come these bogus telephone solicitations for the LAPD.

There are 11 groups licensed to solicit money for fire and law enforcement associations in the city of Los Angeles, but officials like Police Commissioner Art Maddox have been unable to find a single contribution that those groups have made directly to the LAPD.

In addition to the licensed efforts, there are other scams. In the San Fernando Valley, for example, residents were targeted after the recent wildfires by a fund-raising group operating out of a hotel room. Potential donors were told that they would be donating money that would help the police and fire departments recover after fighting the Malibu blaze.

“They take the hot issue of the day . . . next week, it could be the child molester in the Valley, and exploit it,” Maddox said. “They take advantage of people.”

Added City Council member Laura Chick: “The public is innocently responding to the wrong people when they answer the call to help the cash-strapped LAPD.”

To be sure, the LAPD needs help, with its aging fleet of stall-prone patrol cars, its faulty handcuffs and lacking such household basics as answering machines, Polaroid cameras and pagers.

Providing some relief is a relatively simple matter. Simply call your local LAPD station and work through its recognized booster organizations, such as the Police Activity League Supporters.

For the LAPD’s West Valley Division, those interested in making contributions to the LAPD should call 818-989-8406 or 342-5725; for the Van Nuys Division, 989-8308; for North Hollywood, 989-8838; for Foothill, 989-8866, and for Devonshire, 989-8270.

Calling directly will ensure that your donation gets to the LAPD.