Seeking Top Job Gives LAPD Official a Platform to Speak His Mind

Los Angeles Police Department Cmdr. Art Lopez would rather take a chance than lose an opportunity.

So for the second time, Lopez is seeking the department’s top position. He is one of six semifinalists being interviewed by the Police Commission to fill the chief’s job. The commission will forward three names later this month to Mayor Richard Riordan, who will select one for City Council approval.

Even if he doesn’t get that far, Lopez, 47, said he wants the chance to pass on some of his views to the commission, particularly on community policing, flexible scheduling and stepping up the number of arrests by the LAPD.

“I look at this not only as an opportunity to possibly become the chief of police but also to say some of the things that need to be said,” Lopez said during a recent interview.

Lopez is currently overseeing the proposed merger between the city’s transit police and the LAPD, working out of a ground-floor office in the back of Metropolitan Transportation Authority headquarters.

It hasn’t been an easy job for the 26-year LAPD veteran, who was born in East Los Angeles and grew up in Monterey Park. The merger has been the focus of controversy among the City Council, the MTA and the LAPD. The move would shift responsibility for policing the city’s public transportation system from the MTA to the LAPD, and critics worry about the two departments working together.

Supporters say Lopez has worked tirelessly, putting in long days answering questions from policymakers and writing novel-length reports that he describes as “volumes two and three of ‘War and Peace.’ ”

“The MTA merger is an opportunity to build a law enforcement agency for the LAPD,” said Lopez, sitting in the MTA cafeteria and looking more CEO than cop, dressed in a navy blue suit and print silk tie. “It’s a real interesting proposition. How many people have this opportunity?”

Some might ask, who would want it? Lopez has had to break the news that at least 27 transit officers probably will not qualify to join the LAPD. Most of them will lose their jobs if the merger proceeds.

In understatement, Lopez called the job challenging, and emotional. “I’ve cried on my lieutenant’s shoulder,” he said.

Some are critical of Lopez’s work. One official who works with him closely said Lopez provides the council and others with too much material that is not well-conceived or analyzed, a “data dump.”

Los Angeles City Councilwoman Laura Chick, who heads the Public Safety Committee, said: “I find him to be a very likable, caring person and very hard-working and dedicated to the LAPD. But I’ve had great frustrations in achieving clear and accurate and reliable communications from him in our work on the MTA-LAPD merger contract.”

Lopez said he’s a man of action--not undue contemplation.

“We tend to just study everything to death,” Lopez said, adding that he believes analysis is critical at times but unnecessary at others.

LAPD interim Chief Bayan Lewis praised Lopez’s handling of the complicated transit plan, saying he has been “a very dedicated and principled” player in it.

“He’s always done everything that’s ever been asked of him,” Lewis said. “He sets the tone for all the others in doing a good job.”

Lopez receives high marks, too, from community members and officers with whom he has worked. His first command assignment was the Hollenbeck station in 1988 and 1989.

“He has a tremendous amount of motivation to do what is right,” said Ruben Padilla, president of the Latin American Law Enforcement Assn. “He is always there for the officers and the community. . . . [When] you meet Cmdr. Lopez, you fall in love with the guy. He’s charismatic. He’s friendly.”

Steve Barba, a past president of the Boyle Heights Chamber of Commerce, worked closely with Lopez while he was at Hollenbeck. “He always was willing to listen to concerns within the community and he took immediate action,” Barba said.

Lopez said he would also take quick action if chief. First on his agenda, he says, is the creation of clear goals that officers can recite from memory. Then he wants to expand community-based policing so residents have more contact with and influence on local police.

Community-based policing, he said, is more than just officers getting to know neighbors.

“Arrests are part of community-based policing in Art Lopez’s LAPD,” he said, referring to himself in the third person, something he does often. “We need to revisit our standards, look at arrests, look at productivity.”

Lopez said he has not forgotten his experience as a young patrol officer in North Hollywood, where he began work in 1971. He had trained after high school to be a commercial pilot but followed his older brother’s footsteps into the LAPD when he couldn’t find a job flying. His brother, 15 years older and now retired from the police force, was a guiding light, Lopez said.

Since then, some conditions have grown worse, he said. Equipment, for example, needs to be upgraded. He would like to upgrade the city’s police stations, as well as poll rank-and-file officers to find ways to boost morale.

“We need to start asking our employees their opinions,” he said. “We need to ask their advice. We need to empower them.”

To that end, Lopez said he would implement a controversial work schedule that would allow officers to work three 12-hour days a week, a proposal popular among officers.

“He’s very in tune with the needs of the troops,” said Dennis Zine, a police union director. “He’s genuine, concerned and ambitious.”

Lopez, whose candidacy for chief is backed by Padilla, president of the Latin American officers group, said even his own mother was surprised at his ambition to be chief. He had applied for the job once before, when former Chief Daryl F. Gates quit five years ago.

You’re only a commander (one rank lower than contenders Bernard Parks, Mark Kroeker and David Gascon, all deputy chiefs), she told him this time.

No matter. It’s a chance worth taking, he said.

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

Candidate Profile: Art Lopez

Lopez, a Los Angeles Police Department commander, is overseeing the proposed LAPD merger with the MTA police.

Age: 47

Residence: San Fernando Valley

Education: Bachelor’s degree in public administration from USC; master’s in management from Cal Poly Pomona.

Career highlights: Joined LAPD in 1971; promoted to commander in 1991 as assistant/acting commanding officer of the Personnel and Training Bureau; ran South Bureau in 1991-92; currently traffic/transit coordinator.

Interests: Reading, running and golf

Family: Married with two college-age daughters.

Quote: “I look at this not only as an opportunity to possibly become the chief of police, but also to say some of the things that need to be said. I have ideas on how the organization should be run.”

Q & A

Define community policing. What would you do to implement it?

“It means partnering with the community and working on problems identified by the community, and it means joint responsibility for all of that--very simply. It has been a slippery fish. We need to put some bones in that fish.... We need to incorporate three things to effectively have community policing: a customer service focus ... more training in human resources for our officers ... and we need total participation from everyone inside the organization.”

How would you gauge police productivity? What role do arrests play in that area?

“Everyone inside our organization has forgotten what our business is: crime and response times, service levels and quality of life issues, partnering and problem-solving. We need to develop clear performance standards.... We need to be able to measure that performance. We need a solid method of evaluating personnel ... new penalty guidelines and quicker investigations from Internal Affairs. Arrests are part of the package. We need to focus our efforts on making the correct arrests ... and that includes more training.

What would you hope to accomplish in the first year of your administration? What key reforms still need to be made?

“We need to look at our mission statement, shorten it and make sure everyone understands our business ... it has to be the bible....We need to look at our structure, we need to flatten the organization.... We need to take an internal survey so we know where our problems are.... We need to begin the 3/12 compressed work schedule [in which officers work three 12-hour days a week]; and I’d find a way to get officers .45s if they want them.”

How would you deal with racism, sexism and discrimination within the department?

“Affirmative action, diversity, human relations all tie together.... We really have to look at ourselves and at our core values and put that in our rating system. I’m advocating standards and goals ... and we need a better, stronger rating system. We need to look at the characteristics of our leaders and let people know this is what we are all about. We need clear penalties.”

How would you hold captains, lieutenants and sergeants accountable for police effectiveness?

“We need a detailed look at where crime is happening, like New York has.... The trick is to then see what the officers are doing about it. The captains and the bureau commanding officers must be held accountable for what’s occurring.... People need to know what’s expected of them. They need to have a clear disciplinary system. We’re changing our methods but we’ve never changed our standards.”