More of same in DC: New chief says overnight crime patrols to continue
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Okay, I’ll say it if no one else will. It appears that the policy of making DC firefighters park overnight in certain neighborhoods as a crime deterrent won’t end until a firefighter is wounded or killed. The incoming chief of the department, Eugene Jones, told Andrea Noble at The Washington Times that this policy, called “soft posting’, will continue under his watch.
Sorry Chief Jones, you haven’t even taken over as chief of the DC Fire & EMS Department and you already blew your first public policy statement. In doing so, you’ve shown that pleasing your boss, Deputy Mayor Paul Quander, is more important than the safety of the men and women you will be leading. Maybe you should spend the nine days before Chief Ellerbe departs to rethink this one and get your priorities straightened out.
Apparently a dozen shots fired at firefighters and police over the weekend at a crash scene in a neighborhood near where the same fire company was on crime patrol a few hours earlier isn’t enough evidence for Quander, Ellerbe and Jones about the foolishness of “soft posting”. If the criminals are willing to open fire when police are on the scene how will they feel about those unarmed firefighters sitting by themselves on the corner at 2:00 in the morning?
Oh, that’s right, as far as city officials are concerned the incident of a gunman shooting at firefighters really is nothing. After all, the department didn’t even find it tweet-worthy. But I did read about an elevator malfunction from @DCFIREEMS.
And the incident certainly wasn’t important enough for Chief Ellerbe, Chief Jones or Deputy Mayor Quander to interrupt their weekend to make a public statement. Not one of these three men showed up in news coverage on Sunday letting it be known that DC will not tolerate its firefighters being attacked. How does a chief not make a showing when something like this occurs?
Funny how they do suddenly appear when Quander’s pet “soft posting” program is questioned because of the shooting incident. Now there is a statement, with Chief Jones telling us it will be business as usual for firefighter crime patrols.
Assistant Chief Eugene Jones said he has no problem with “soft posting” firefighters and will continue the strategy when he takes over for retiring Fire Chief Kenneth B. Ellerbe on July 2.
“It is an important strategy that is beneficial to the citizens,” Chief Jones said.
“Anyone who asserts that this incident is an example of how soft posting should be stopped are either ill-advised, misinformed or not interested in facts,” department spokesman Tim Wilson said.
Read entire article by Andrea Noble of The Washington Times
Well call me ill-advised, misinformed and uninterested in the facts, because I say you’re full of it Tim Wilson. Firefighters being shot at in this manner is not some trivial event, despite you failing to even tweet about it.
And despite your statement to the contrary Mr. Wilson, there is a connection to your bosses forcing firefighters to sit for four hours in the dark without police protection in the same or adjacent crime-plagued neighborhoods. But like Chief Jones, you refuse to acknowledge that connection or the stupidity of “soft postings” because Paul Quander won’t let you.
When a firefighter does get hurt at one of these soft postings, I’m sure Wilson, Jones and Quander will be ready with more BS statements telling us it wasn’t their fault.
