Plan to Merge Police Agencies Criticized

Los Angeles Police Chief Willie L. Williams’ ambitious plan to take control of the city’s independent police agencies suffered a setback Tuesday when his civilian bosses refused to endorse the proposal, saying it lacked details and had not been thoroughly studied.

“Quite frankly, I don’t have enough information to say . . . this is the right thing to do even though it does seem sensible,” said Police Commission President Raymond Fisher. “I’d like to see how this would work out.”

The commissioners, who are in the midst of deciding whether to appoint the chief to a second five-year term, criticized a 22-page report compiled at the direction of Williams. They said they would not approve a study based on untested assumptions.

Nonetheless, the panel voted 3 to 0--with two commissioners absent--to pass the report on to the City Council committee that had asked the chief to develop the plan. Commissioners said they will send the report to City Hall without their endorsement, and with a list of their concerns about a possible consolidation.

Williams and his staff acknowledged in the report and during questioning by commissioners that the proposal was thin on details. They promised that a more comprehensive study would be done if the concept gains the support of city leaders. Part of the problem, police officials said, was lack of access to important information kept by the seven independent city agencies the LAPD wants to control.

“We’re going to have to get inside the books to really study this,” said Cmdr. Art Lopez, who is leading the LAPD consolidation analysis.

Under the proposal, LAPD would add at least 1,070 sworn officers to the department by taking over policing duties at city parks, schools, housing projects, airports, buses and trains. Despite the addition of officers to the LAPD, there would be no additional officers in the city. The consolidation, if approved, could take as long as 10 years to implement, according to the chief’s report.

The commissioners said the consolidation plan may have merit, but they could not tell from the report.

“It’s hard to endorse a concept without further information,” said Commissioner Edith Perez.

“I understand this is complicated,” Fisher said.

But he added that the report was “written as if we’ve solved” the problems associated with adding the different police agencies and more than 1,700 sworn and non-sworn employees to the LAPD.

Specifically, commissioners said, the report failed to fully probe the financial, personnel, administrative and deployment problems that could potentially arise from the “one city, one police department” proposal.

According to Williams’ preliminary evaluation, the law enforcement consolidation under the LAPD would not pose much of a financial burden to the city, and could end up saving taxpayers money through elimination of duplicative administrative functions and the hiring of civilians to perform some tasks that are now handled by police.

Also, LAPD officials said a consolidation would improve public safety and police services because it would result in more effective coordination of officers within the city’s borders.

The report states that the downsides to consolidating could include inadequate training levels for officers at other agencies, a view among some LAPD officers that their counterparts in other agencies are not qualified to do the job, and initial “salary and start-up” costs linked to creating a mega-agency.

The report recommended that the consolidation occur in the following order: the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, park rangers, airport police, Housing Authority police, Los Angeles Unified School District police and Department of General Services security.

Williams’ report concluded that the consolidation was in the best financial and public safety interest of the city’s residents.

“I don’t buy that,” said Fisher, adding that more research on the issue needs to be done to justify that sort of conclusion.

Lopez agreed that more work needed to be done, but said LAPD officials are convinced that the massive consolidation concept is a good one.

“We think the Los Angeles Police Department should be in control of all of these independent agencies,” Lopez told the commissioners. “How we go about it . . . is the area in which we are in dispute and that’s where we need to complete our analysis.”

Williams’ report will be presented Monday to the City Council’s Public Safety Committee, which had requested that the chief develop a position on the issue of merging all law enforcement agencies in the city.

The request was made in response to a proposal to have MTA police merge with the LAPD. Negotiations on that plan have bogged down over financial, administrative and personnel issues.