Chicago's pathetic attempt to do more w/less .....shortchanging the law abiding complaintant ........ The Wall Street Journal
POLITICS
February 5, 2013, 7:36 p.m. ET
Chicago Dials Back on 911 Responses
Dispatchers Won't Send Police to Minor Incidents So They Can Work on Reducing Number of Homicides
By JACK NICAS
CHICAGO?Police here stopped physically responding to some 911 calls for non-life-threatening issues this week so officers can focus on stemming the city's rising homicide rate, a strategy that other big cities have implemented with sometimes controversial results.
Under the new policy, dispatchers will route 911 calls reporting non-criminal complaints or crimes in which no one is in imminent danger, such as some car thefts and simple assaults, to desk officers who will fill out police reports by phone. The new policy prohibits callers from insisting an officer be sent to the scene, as was allowed before.
The Chicago Police Department says it now expects to handle about 151,000 police reports by telephone this year, or about 30% of their total, roughly twice as many as last year. The department estimates the new approach will free the equivalent of 44 officers a day in a force of roughly 12,000 officers.
The move is the latest effort by Chicago police to combat the city's homicide rate. The city had 506 murders in 2012, the highest since 2008, and last month was the deadliest January since 2002. Late last week, Chicago Police Superintendent Garry McCarthy pulled 200 officers from administrative positions to teams focused on preventing gun violence and gang crimes.
"I'm less concerned about backing up the radio and more concerned with violence on the streets," Mr. McCarthy told city councilors last year when the 911 policy was being discussed. "We have to handle calls for service, but?I have to make policy decisions that are going to free those officers up to stop the violence," he said.
Michael Shields, president of the Chicago Fraternal Order of Police, said the shift in policy was minor and questioned the department's estimate of the impact. "I don't see where they're coming up with those figures," said Mr. Shields, who is fighting with the city over police staffing. "This is another example of trying to distract the public?when there really is no change."
Since the adoption of the 911 system in the 1970s and 1980s, many major cities have similarly shifted their 911 response from officers on patrol to those in an office, said former Newark, N.J., Police Capt. Jon Shane, now a criminal-justice professor at John Jay College. He said police in New York, Los Angeles, Philadelphia, Detroit, Houston and Newark all respond to some portion of 911 calls simply by phone.
Milwaukee Police Chief Ed Flynn said his department and Chicago were now expanding the use of the telephone as the primary response for non-emergency 911 calls. For some types of 911 calls in Milwaukee, such as family disputes, most physical responses from police simply end with advice, Mr. Flynn said. The 911 system has driven law enforcement to a predicament "where police spend almost their entire time reacting to crimes rather than preventing them," he said.
When Mr. Flynn became chief in Milwaukee in 2008, he said he started directing the department's 150 light-duty officers?those restricted by medical issues?to handle non-emergency 911 calls. Last year, those officers took 37,000, or 14%, of the city's dispatched calls.
Some Chicago residents and local politicians are upset with the new 911 strategy. Chicago Alderman Scott Waguespack said he was already hearing from constituents worried the shift "will create more problems, like higher insurance and an open house for burglars." He said he hopes the strategy works, "but off the bat it looks pretty bad."
There are also some unseen consequences of handling more 911 calls by phone, such as an increase in fraudulent reporting and the potential to miss crime-scene evidence. Mr. Shane said that years ago, when Newark police began handling reports of cellphone thefts via phone, "we discovered people were running up extremely large cellphone bills, dodging the phone?and then taking the police report back to the company" in order to get out of paying the bill.
Chicago's police department said it would only handle 911 calls via phone if an officer determines that the victim is safe, that the offender is not on the scene or expected to return, and that an officer on the scene is not necessary for the immediate investigation.
Write to Jack Nicas at jack.nicas@wsj.com