Opening of new LAPD jail threatened by staffing shortages

The Los Angeles Police Department's soon-to-be-completed jail is likely to be unusable because of staffing shortages, LAPD officials said today.

In a presentation to the Los Angeles Police Commission, Commander Jeffrey Greer told members of the civilian oversight panel that the department needs 164 detention officers to operate the $74-million Metropolitan Detention Center in downtown Los Angeles.

Only 83 detention officers are required to staff the old, smaller jail currently in use, Greer said, meaning the department needs to nearly double the size of the downtown jail staff. In addition, 19 detention officer positions at the downtown facility and satellite jails at some police stations are currently vacant, bringing the total number of new hires needed to 100.

Even in flush times, such an increase would have been a challenge, but with the city in the grips of a roughly $500-million budget shortfall, it is all but impossible. The LAPD has been ordered to cut $160 million from its budget and, for months, every city department has been under a civilian hiring freeze.

Detention officers, also called jailers, fall under this freeze since they are not sworn officers, but specially trained civilians. To hire more jailers, the LAPD first would have to receive a special exemption from the city-wide freeze.

"We're in a tough situation right now," Greer acknowledged to the commission.

The jail is meant to hold people arrested as they await arraignment, typically for no more than four days.

On any given shift, 62 detention officers would be needed in the new jail, double the number needed at the current site, Greer said. The new jail does not have twice the capacity, but the increased staffing is needed because the size of the jail is much larger and the facility is broken into several separate pod areas.

Originally projected to be completed in March 2008, the new jail has been beset by months of construction delays. City construction officials handed the keys of the jail over to the LAPD early this summer so the department could make small changes and train its jailers to run it, Rhonda Sims-Lewis, head of the LAPD's Administration and Technical Services Bureau, said in an interview. It is expected to be ready for use by Feb. 1.

Opening only part of the jail would not be feasible because of security concerns and because there would be too few cells available to house the constantly fluctuating number of suspects, Greer said in response to a question from a commissioner.

Commission President John Mack directed Greer to more fully explore the idea of raising funds for the jail by leasing out space to federal agencies in need of cell space.

Mack and LAPD Chief William J. Bratton expressed concern over the situation, but reiterated early promises that the department would not resort to using police officers to fill the empty positions. Bratton called on elected city officials to clear the way for hiring more jailers.

"It is going to require the city to take a much more focused look at these personnel needs," he said.

--Joel Rubin at LAPD headquarters

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Comments

[larry]

The council also voted to freeze hiring of new cops, to forget the basic min. goal of 10,000 needed to keep our streets safe, starting with abandoning the current class of LAPD recruits in training. This at the behest of the Police Union which wants to preserve pay and benefits of existing cops, instead of agreeing to some cuts so the force can expand and be ready to hit the ground running WHEN the city/ council gets its act together again and balances the budget.

The PPL has bought and paid for some of the politicians in office, most notably the new City Attorney who they spent a fortune on, because they can control him. Their views are opposite to those of the mayor and chief who care deeply about the current force but not strictly from a union perspective - even this paper's Editorial has endorsed their views.

Too bad the council today acted against the broader interests of public safety when it comes to both staffing the long-needed jail AND maintaining the police force.

[Lloyd Scott]

Talk about keystone cops, I needed a laugh being unemployed, they are about to open a new jail and they are short staffed, politics at its silliest!

[Astonished]

Wait! Isn't there a hard hiring freeze in effect? How did they think they were going to staff this place, with robots? If they hire there, they need to hire everywhere else also, since most Departments are so understaffed that nothing is getting done.

[Detention officer class January 1999.]

I was a jailer at Parker Center jail (Metro-jail section) for 2 years. We operated at 50% of staffing minimums for the entire time. I saw officers praying that we wouldn't get taken over and killed. Police officers brought in to help staff threatened to quit if they weren't re-assigned back totheir regular divisions. I like so many others quit and became a cop in another city. I look back at those days and cringe. I cannot believe i allowed myself to be placed in that kind of danger without proper training,equipment and status(peace officer).The Detention officer postion should be made sworn immediately. To my brothers and sisters still doing the job, keep your head up and stay strong.

[popo]

larry what's the use in hiring more police officers when you are going to assign them to a non-patrol duty, like many of them are doing now. roughly, around half of your police officers are behind a desk or performing something that does not require a police officer to do. just trying to meet this artificial number of 10k is stupid when you will be furloughing tenure police officers. let's look at better using the exsisting resources.

[tarheelchief]

In the commercial real estate world,the contractors pay a penalty for not meeting completion dates. These penalties can injure the contractor and make their lives really terrible in bad publicity and in a future ability to bid.This is not the defense department contractual delay,this one is strictly make workOne needs to examine the public reaction to the Big Dig to recall and our local subway system.How is it the railroad and port authority can get things done on time,but the city cannot?
I am not sure how much money is being moved into campaign coffers of local politicians,but it isn't enough to stop the stench of broken promises.

[Jeff]

detention officers are part of public safety, however, the department treats them like crap. they do not see them as critical and are neglected and a step child. things will not change until someone would just step back and see how they treat these detention officers. let's face it, they deal with some of the most violent prisoners and are subjected to tremendous amount of stress. yes, i do agree that they should have peace officer status...but it will never happen cause the dept is too one dimensional. i say this cause i know some detention officers that work the lapd jails.

[J Hadai]

They shouldnt have built it in the first place it was and will continue to be a waste of taxpayers dollars.The facilities they have are adiquit and they even take in prisioners from other systems...and since when are jails considered viable money makeing options for a city anyway? Do they even realise how many prisions were built all over the US that are sitting half empty since the federal lease money that pays facilities for the houseing of prisioners dried up. LA wake up...prisions no longer make money...this was not a good investment of your money! The federal government is now releasing prisioners rather then paying the fees to lease prisioner space...i just hope they stop throwing money away building these facilities for prisioners and maybe start investing some back into the city...maybe some schools and much needed rehabs to the older parts of the city...maybne then LA would produce more viable citezens and less dropouts and criminals...oh wait...then that would cut into their money making jail and prision facilities...WTH?!?