The police department tried to remove Crime Reduction Teams (CRTs) from parts of the city. A CRT is a squad of half a dozen police officers plus their sergeant, who do not patrol in response to calls for help but concentrate instead on identified trouble spots, such as a corner with heavy street dealing.
Neighbors objected angrily to the CRT reassignments. Sure, crisis areas need special attention, but why should any neighborhood be abandoned? That only guarantees that its problem spots will grow into crisis points, too.
So the police chief wrote us a letter assuring us that we can have our cake and eat it, too. The CRTs will focus on an upsurge of killings and armed robberies in parts of east Oakland, but no area will lose its CRT. Please overlook the fact that "your" CRT will be out of your area most of the time.
The chief's letter tiptoes around the brutal underlying fact: Oakland has half a police department. In "ordinary" times, our neighborhoods are not peaceful; we simply do not have enough police to maintain public safety. But when a wave of even more crime swells up, things must get worse in some places while the understaffed police force, ground down by mandatory overtime, desperately tries to maintain the thin blue line along its weakest stretches.
Meanwhile, you are paying the Measure Y taxes. They were going to bring Oakland up to 802 officers, but instead the force has shrunk by several dozen officers, to below 700.
November 9, 2005
Dear Neighbors,
In my 40 years of police work, three specific types of crime indicate the potential for escalating violence: homicide, assault with a deadly weapon and armed robbery. Over the past few months, Oakland has experienced a spike in all three of these categories, primarily in East Oakland; Police Service Areas 4, 5 and 6. In these areas, homicides, and shootings are up approximately 20% over last year's statistics.
Although the spike in violent crime is localized, the effect is not. Crime that occurs anywhere in Oakland affects the quality of life everywhere within our City. For this reason, such a dramatic increase in violence must be met with a deliberate and swift response, using the resources, deployment strategies and enforcement tactics at our command to suppress violent crime in these hot spots and keep it from spreading to other neighborhoods. These resources include officers from: Crime Reduction Teams, Traffic Enforcement Units, Problem Solving Officers, Campus Life and Security Section, Special Operations Group and when available from the Patrol Division Watches.
To that end, I have implemented a strategic plan that is consistent with conventional law enforcement practices in which crime patterns are systematically evaluated and personnel are strategically deployed according to emerging crime patterns and urgent needs. This is not a new tactic and is being employed in a particularly aggressive manner to halt the unacceptable upward trend of violence in certain sectors of our community.
Effective immediately and for the remainder of the calendar year, under this plan:
·Crime Reduction Teams will be deployed citywide, as needed, to support patrol officers in hot spot areas.
·The primary role of the Crime Reduction Teams (CRTs) is to mitigate and address identifiable trends and patterns in violent and narcotic crimes.
·There will be no change in the CRT command and supervisory structure. This means that the lieutenants currently assigned to each of the six (6) Police Service Areas (PSAs) will continue to be responsible for addressing the crime in those areas.
·None of the CRTs are being disbanded nor moved to another command structure. Each of the six (6) CRTs will maintain their existing staffing of six (6) officers supervised by a sergeant, commanded by a lieutenant, with all forty-eight (48) Neighborhood Services Division (NSD) police personnel coordinated by Captain Cyril Vierra the Commander of the Neighborhood Services Division.
·Each week Captain Vierra and his team will meet with other Department staff (i.e., Crime Analysis, Criminal investigation, etc. personnel) and will evaluate the crime statistics, target areas, deployment schedule and tactics to determine effectiveness and where necessary make adjustments to the deployment plans.
·All deployment plans will address the needs of each Police Service Area. Crime Reduction Teams will continue to address crime issues in the area to which they are primarily assigned.
Driving down this spike in violence will require the dedication, cooperation and support of the entire community. As your police chief, I am committed to making a dramatic change, and I need your continued assistance.
Thank you for providing your vigilant eyes and ears to report crime and suspicious activity. You should continue to work closely with the your PSA lieutenants and Neighborhood Services Coordinator to report crime and other police related problems, To increase community participation and input, if you have not done so already, please join a Neighborhood Crime Prevention Council or Home Alert group in your neighborhood. Call Ms. Claudia Albano by phone at 510-238-6372 for more information about these programs. Together we can make Oakland a safer community for our families.
If you have questions or concerns about this approach to mitigating violent crime problems, please free to contact Captain Cyril Vierra at 777-8511.
Sincerely,
Wayne G. Tucker
Chief of Police
Oakland Police Department
– Nov. 10, 2005, updated Dec. 10, 2005
