Last month, Springfield Police Commissioner Edward Flynn and his chief of staff, Jennifer Flagg, sat down to meet with attorney Donald Stern, who served as chair of Governor Deval Patrick‘s transition working group on public safety. The final report (PDF) of that group is now available online, as well as all the others, including transcripts of the public meetings and residents’ online comments submitted.
Flynn said that he had a "two-fold conversation" with Stern: on one hand, Flynn provided some insight about the drastic changes he implemented in the state’s Executive Office of Public Safety over the course of just over three years, during which the funding for the office was quadrupled. On the other hand, Flynn had the opportunity to comment on the governor’s pledge to hire 1,000 new police officers across the state, which the Boston Globe reports today may need to be tweaked a bit by stretching the hires over time.
Commissioner Flynn sits in on a Finance Control Board meeting last November. Seated in the next row is his chief of staff Jennifer Flagg.
The two discussed Springfield-specific policing challenges. About Patrick’s pledge for more officers, Flynn said he told Stern, "It’s a fine idea, it’s a great challenge. There’s 351 cities and towns [in Massachusetts], and everybody’s going to want three cops." In order to have an impact, Flynn suggested using "some formula that weights population and violent crime, and apportions these officers accordingly."
Today’s Globe article quotes Massachusetts Municipal Association executive director Geoff Beckwith, who will host Governor Patrick at an MMA meeting this coming Saturday. From the article, by Andrea Estes:
According to …Beckwith, cities and towns are looking for more local aid and more police officers. They still have questions about Patrick’s pledge to hire 1,000 police officers, including which communities would receive the officers and who would bear the ongoing costs, including their yearly salaries and benefits.
"There are ancillary costs that come with any employee, from training, equipment, staffing, cruisers," he said. "We would want to make sure [the costs] are sustainable on a state and local level."
At his meeting with Stern, Flynn suggested that there are cost-saving, alternative ways to "create" 1,000 officer positions. "One is to hire new officers by picking up their salary," he said. "Another is to work with us to create efficiencies that allow us to put more of our officers on the street, that for one reason or another have to work inside."
One way to do that, Flynn said, is with grants for technology, for example, or perhaps grants that support the sharing of lockup facilities in the region. "We’ve got 60 jail cells here," he said. "Over the course of 24 hours, I have 15 officers inside the building making that work. If I could take my prisoners somewhere else nearby, and drop them off, that’s as good to me as hiring 15 cops." Flynn highlighted the need for juvenile facilities, saying, "There are very few facilities that can accommodate [juveniles]. We all end up driving all over the state trying to put our kids in beds if they can’t be bailed out."
Flynn said he urged Stern to reach out to police chiefs for ideas on how improved technology might enable more flexibility for officers’ duties, or improve "prisoner processing." Overall he was looking for ways to increase the effectiveness of existing offers "without necessarily simply putting 1,000 more people on a payroll."
"Despite every governor’s best intentions," Flynn said, "the world they encounter when they take office is inevitably different from the world they imagined when they were running for office. It’s not a reflection on anybody. [Patrick’s administration is] going to learn it as well. Therefore, it’s going to be important that they be willing to adapt some of their ideas to changing conditions."
Apparently one to look on the bright side, Flynn added that maybe Springfield’s crime rate "could do us some good" by attracting "the type of resources that can make an impact" in reducing illegal activity.
In his Springfield speech last Saturday night, Governor Patrick promised to be governor of "the whole state." To what degree is Springfield on his map? As Flynn noted, hundreds of cities and towns may be able to make a case for more officers, but if priority is placed on certain cities based on data, will Springfield still show up near the top of the list?
