Inglewood to Hire 9 Police Officers With Federal Grant

Inglewood plans to use the $1-million grant it received from the federal government this week to hire nine police officers and station them in four public safety outposts.

The outposts will be at school sites and serve surrounding neighborhoods. They represent the latest step in an effort by the city to implement community-based policing, law enforcement’s response to chronic crime.

“This is where you’ll have officers out there not just going on calls for service but solving problems, responding to (the needs of a neighborhood),” Police Chief Oliver M. Thompson said.

Thompson expects to begin setting up the first public safety outpost in about a month. He said the city already has enough officers to start staffing the first outpost before the nine officers are hired.

Inglewood and Los Angeles were the only cities in Los Angeles County to receive some of the nearly $50 million in police hiring grants awarded Monday by President Clinton. Inglewood was among 74 cities and counties to win grants out of more than 1,000 that applied nationwide.

“Look at what Los Angeles got, $4 million, and they’re a lot bigger than us, and we got $1 million,” said Mayor Edward Vincent. Inglewood’s population is about 109,600, compared to Los Angeles’ approximate 3.5 million people.

The Clinton Administration set up the grant program specifically for cities that face severe budget restrictions and have already begun implementing community-based policing.

As with all the cities receiving the grants, Inglewood must match the $1 million, which the federal government will pay out over the next three years. The cost of operating and staffing the four school outposts will be about $600,000 annually, said Mark Weinberg, commander of the administrative services unit of the Inglewood Police Department.

Each outpost will have a lead officer and two assistants, Weinberg said. Three officers already assigned to work in school drug prevention programs will be part of the three-person teams at each outpost.

Two school sites have already been chosen. One is Inglewood High School and its nearby feeder school, George W. Crozier Junior High School. The other is the three-school complex in the southeastern portion of the city made up of Morningside High School, Albert Monroe Junior High School and Clyde Woodworth Elementary School.

The other two school sites will be chosen soon by school and city officials, Weinberg said, adding that the availability of space will play a part in determining which sites are chosen to house a public safety office.

Community-based policing, Weinberg said, is often confused with community relations efforts in which police visit school classrooms, meet with block clubs, walk beats or hand out candy at parks.

Community-based policing, he said, is an administrative technique with two key methods. The first is to develop partnerships with block clubs, schools, businesses and other existing community organizations to fight crime. The second is to give police officers the time and authority to identify root causes of crime, Weinberg said.

Under traditional policing methods, crime-fighting is conducted mainly by patrol officers who respond to incidents. Officers don’t try to help figure out how to prevent the next incident, as they would under community policing, Weinberg said.

To illustrate his point, he used the hypothetical example of gang members meeting in a park around midnight every night.

“Under the old style policing,” Weinberg said, “police officers would respond there night after night and they would direct the gang members to leave the park.” Under community-oriented policing, he said, the lead officer might contact the city parks department to see that lighting is increased or that existing park lights are left on all night instead of being turned out at 10 p.m.

The lead officer might also urge the parks department to switch the watering time from morning to midnight, making it impossible for gang members to gather there.

“These people,” Weinberg said, referring to the officers, “are not going to be anchored at desks at these schools.” Both Weinberg and Chief Thompson stressed that the new teams will also answer calls for service and patrol their areas.

And, Weinberg added, the new teams will have what he calls “beat integrity.” Patrol officers are often assigned different routes nightly, depending on where they are needed, he said. But the new teams will regularly be assigned to one geographical area, allowing them to get to know that area and its residents.