Chicago, IL—FOP Lodge 7 has failed miserably in the past to
properly represent the men and women of the Chicago police Department. The leadership of the FOP has been bedding
down with city politicians and a couple of really lame appointed police
superintendents. We can only guess what the tradeoffs have been.
The department is rapidly shrinking and the position of
police officer grows more dangerous by the hour. Pension funds have been mismanaged, stolen or
otherwise compromised. Officer’s
retirement funding is in grave danger as bankruptcy looms.
The only real source for news about the matters that affect
police officers come from bloggers. The Second
City Cop Blog is the primary source of news cops need to know. The downside is that the some of the blog content
creator/s are anonymous. Publishing the
truth about mismanagement, waste and corruption is hazardous to any working
officer.
The FOP should take on a role of reporting news to its
membership along with the local taxpayers in a very public way. The FOP should bring transparency to issues
such as hiring, promotions and discipline matters that are based almost solely on
political clout.
That means hiring a full time investigative multi-media
journalist along with a producer/video photographer. FOP needs to cover all events that involve officer’s
lives, safety and careers. There should be no less than five news
multimedia stories produced per week.
The FOP reporter needs to call out malicious or deceptive
mainstream media reports about police officers. The reporter can lawfully expose the
criminal history of accusers using available public court records. The reporter can also find and interview
anyone with information that will expose the truth.
I’d create a special FOP News website and call it, “Nightly
Windy City Police Reports.” It would contain
text, pictures and hard-hitting video reports.
The bloggers need to continue and call out the FOP if they
fail to do their jobs. The FOP can have
all the power of a major newspaper or TV news organization. The two media positions are not one for
amateurs or beginners.
I’d hire former WMAQ reporter Amy Jacobson who’s always been very fair and well liked by cops. I’d let her pick the
producer/photographer. I’d take the
producer spot myself if it was offered. In
any event there are plenty of great investigative reporters that can fill this
position.
The FOP needs a bare knuckles reporter that
understands public records laws and information sources. That reporter should be trustworthy in order to protect department and
any city employee whistle blowers.
The
names of the whistle blowers should be given to FOP administration only on a need to
know basis. Actually they don’t have a
need to know.
It’s time to bring serious sunshine on the Chicago Police
Board. They have inequitably and shamelessly saved or destroyed careers based
on clout rather than evidence. The FOP
needs to examine its contract power to force reforms on the Police Board.
The men and women of the Chicago Police Department deserve
something other than lip service from the union that claims to represent them.
Comments
Amy has the experience and ability and she's fair. It's not important that it be Amy but that the reporter knows the job an serves the audience that the FOP is trying to reach.
John is a talk radio host first and foremost it's not a slam that he is not suitable because his career took a different direction.
whats needed is a great investigative TV investigative reporter that is acceptable to the membership of the FOP. Amy has never been anti-police. Calling attention to issues of dangers of police chases opens dialog. We just want the street cop's point of view lost in the shuffle like it is now.