UPDATE
: Video of Ganim and Perez’ comments at the police recruit graduation yesterday (Sep 19, 2016).
Ganim’s comments:
Perez’ comments:
Understaffed and battling summer spikes in violent crime, Mayor Joe Ganim and Police Chief AJ Perez attended the graduation of 31 police recruits Monday 6 p.m. at the Klein Memorial Auditorium, 910 Fairfield Avenue.
Ganim and Perez said the new class is “the most diverse in Bridgeport history” and includes 29 Bridgeport residents and nine women. This is the first of three planned police recruit classes to graduate and replenish the depleted ranks of the Police Department that has fallen below 400 officers. The city suffered many police losses to retirements and poaching by area departments. A renewed emphasis recruiting city residents for the examination, say police officials, provides confidence that familiarity will strengthen law enforcement efforts.
Public safety has been both a blessing and curse for Ganim. As a candidate seeking a comeback last year it was a powerful issue against incumbent Bill Finch who recited lower stats in the face of violent crime. Now Ganim as mayor owns the state of public safety as his own similar to his first tenure as mayor, albeit violent crime not as high as it was in the early 1990s.
Twenty-nine Bridgeport residents? Can they read above kindergarten level?
I will guess most of them can read their union contract with the City. And some know how to shop for whipped cream. Some may even blog under pseudonyms, but why do you really attack the issue of reading comprehension of new officers?
Bad night for you? Tough to get enough rest? Check out the emotional intelligence posters on the walls of the next public school you enter, or just ask a 5th grader. They may be more up to speed on this than you. Time will tell.
Wait a minute, “Ganim and Perez say the new class is “the most diverse in Bridgeport history” and includes 29 Bridgeport residents and nine women,” 9 women but the Bridgeport Fire Department in their last three entry-level hiring there have zero (0) women hired. You mean to tell me women can’t pass an entry-level firefighter exam but they can pass a police exam? Bridgeport Fire Department has a number of female firefighters over the past 30 years but now they can’t find one woman. What’s wrong with this picture? Mayor Ganim doesn’t care and there has been no comment from the new Fire Chief, Richard Thode.
What is more important than a City Council meeting? You guessed it! The graduation of a much-awaited class of police officers ready to be sworn in. So it appears the Police Department can repair some of the damage to its numbers and the huge overtime expenses of the past five years, which will translate into even larger retirement incomes in the years ahead.
Lennie, what are exact numbers? Budget in spring said the PD had FILLED 478 with 17 VACANT. That was not honest on their part. Wishful thinking maybe, but not possible as a moving target before June 30 2017. So not honest. Are there 60 non-sworn personnel in the PD? So subtract the non-sworn from 495 and we see approximately 435 as a sworn officer target? Is that right? And is it that target against which the chief has stated there are 340-350 at a given time this year? Help us understand the baseline, please.
However, the repair might not have been necessary if “management,” both within the Department and at City Hall (remember that Danny Roach, current close advisor to Mayor Ganim was Chair of Police Commission for many of the years Joe was out of office) IF leadership had paid attention to the attrition that has been regular. In the last eight years approximately 135 officers are recorded as leaving the Department. Ninety (90) appear to have satisfied 25 or more years of service while about 45 seem to have retired before that date. Whether they get any retirement benefits is something others may know at this moment. I do not.
From a manpower viewpoint however, that is attrition of 17 per year. During this past eight-year period (assuming we were full to personnel charts), having a training class every other year would have solved the problem. Am I missing something? Let’s consider this seriously. Time will tell.
What’s the racial makeup of this class? How many were black and does that number mirror the racial makeup of the city? Time will tell, but will Ganim?
Ask Lt. Blackwell. He was in charge of recruiting for the PD. Oh, never mind.
Lt. Blackwell didn’t give the entry level exam nor did he hire them.
If it were easy, they wouldn’t be doing it. Congratulations and best wishes to the upcoming Police officers’ graduating class. It’s always a good day when recruits join the ranks of Bridgeport’s Finest.
I saw some of these recruits at the Puerto Rican Day parade. I saw one black officer and two females. You wonder how many blacks apply for the test and how many pass. If the number of applicants is low it stands to reason why there’d be so few blacks.
Has anyone ever seen a black female sergeant in the Bridgeport Police Department working on the road? It seems all the high-ranking minority officers are hidden inside the department.
You wonder why this is?
With this ceremony, I would congratulate the newest members of the Bridgeport Police Department. Good Luck and Godspeed to all of them. Any and all ancillary issues, some mentioned in the comments here, need to be addressed at another time and another place.