Many public safety personnel in the City of Portsmouth do not understand the importance of the Civil Service Commission relating to there jobs, job security and advancement opportunities.

I have spent much time researching the rules and laws involving the City of Portsmouth Civil Service Commission. It is so important that I have decided that each meeting which is open to the public by law will be video taped and made available for all to see how the commission functions and the decisions that they make. Those decisions effect every single public safety employee in some way.

Below is the video of the May 29th, 2009 meeting. Most of the meeting is taken up with McCann and Associates explaining the statistics and appeals process for the recent public safety promotional exams given this year. At the end Chief of Police Edward G. Hargis makes a short presentation to the commission on some proposed changes in the department and the hiring process.

I am going to attempt to FOIA the McCann Associates reports presented to the Civil Service Commission about the recent promotional testing and make that available as well.

Picture worth a thousand words;

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* S: (n) confusion, mental confusion, confusedness, muddiness, disarray (a mental state characterized by a lack of clear and orderly thought and behavior) “a confusion of impressions”
* S: (n) disarray, disorderliness (untidiness (especially of clothing and appearance))

Mistakes are made, some worse then others but we are human and that is human nature. It is frustrating to see incidents made to go away because they are of a political nature and the transgressors then have no incentive to discontinue unacceptable behavior.

I have a question for all;

Who does an agency answer to that is charged with protecting and investigating complaints against child and elder abuse when it is alleged that they are the abuser, or the cause/continuation of the neglect?

I thought it was the Police, but apparently that is not the case.

The truth must be controlled and hidden at all costs to preserve the status quo and for those in public service to NOT be held accountable for their actions. What has our government come to that they can not accept responsibility for their actions? FOIA (Freedom of Information Act) has become riddled with exemptions to preserve the hidden secrets that those in power can not afford to reveal lest they find a revolt at there feet and the common people realize just how terrible a government can become, even one that is a republic.

Eventually the scales will tip from one side to the other and that will be a terrible day indeed. What does this all mean I can not tell you as it is a forbidden secret. Click here for a clue…FOIA_041109_email

It appears that someone somewhere decided to look for the cause of the degradation of the City of Portsmouth 800 Mhz Trunked Radio System and they might have found it. From what I have been able to learn the City has done some work on the antenna’s at the main radio site. It appears to have had significant improvements in the operation of the system especially in the Churchland area. I can attest to it first hand. I am actually impressed, their are still some issues but this is definitely a step in the right direction.

Hats off to whoever decided to do some troubleshooting before the city went forward with a multi-million dollar simulcast site in Churchland. I understand the city’s financial issues and as someone who has a contract on a house in Portsmouth and a future resident I don’t want the City of Portsmouth to needlessly waste money. Especially money they don’t have. I think improvements in the operation of the main site are a great step forward but the coverage from the backup site at the Jail also need to be addressed. If the main site goes down because of equipment failure or for maintenance the backup site will be put into service. I have significant concerns with the current radio architecture.

The City of Portsmouth really needs a “Radio System Engineer” to management and address these types of problems. Someone who is an expert in radio telecommunications and system architectures. Currently the radio system is managed by a computer professional. I don’t know if he has any radio telecommunications background or not. He is an IT (Information Technology) professional and I suspect he has no radio background. A computer professional (IT specialist) might be the best IT specialist on the planet but radio systems and computer systems have computers in common but if you have no background in radio telecommunications you are not going to be able to effectively manage a radio telecommunications system. Especially one as complex as a city wide Motorola 800Mhz Trunked Radio system. It took Virginia Beach a number of years to realize this fact and they now have a Radio Engineer dedicated to managing there 800Mhz Motorola Smartnet Simulcast Trunked Radio System.

A step in the right direction. Lets keep it up ..

I received a comment back in January that I have not had time to address until now. Below is the comment and my response;

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First, I never went begging or groveling for my job back. In fact Chief Corvello offered it back to me prior to the Grievance Panel Hearing but I turned him down because I would have had to take punishment for something I didn’t do. That was something I will never be willing to accept.

Second, I stopped writing for a number of reasons. As I said I won my grievance with the City of Portsmouth and was reinstated to my previous position as a Police Officer. That job keeps me very very busy so my time is much more limited then before.  As an employee of the City of Portsmouth I have certain obligations as an employee that I feel I must follow in my blog postings that I did not have when I was not an employee. If you read my goals when I started this blog you will see that many of my goals have been achieved or are being addressed;

1) Got my job back, received $20,000 in backpay and all my benefits.

2) City Council passed the resolution granting a Public Safety pay plan and finally making Public Safety pay “market based” and comparable to the other Police Departments in the area. The city is hoping to stem the flow of Portsmouth Police Officers leaving for better paying jobs in other departments. Their are issues with the Pay Plan and a copy of the report produced by the consultant “Matrix Consulting Group” is available by clicking here. The city will not answer questions about the plan and refer inqueries to Officer Jim Swann who is the President of the local Portsmouth FOP (Fraternal Order of Police) Lodge. Anyone see a problem with that? He is not in HR or in payroll and the city has no business referring any employee to him regarding their pay. Given the current financial situation I do not believe the city will follow through with this long overdue promise and institute the plan in July. I fully expect the City Council to backout of the deal claiming they don’t have the money because of the “economic crisis” not that I thought they could/would come up with the money to fund this before the crisis. I also have heard rumors that the city is saying that the Pay Plan is “Time in Grade” based. I disagree after reading the Matrix Report. It clearly states “An employee will move one step for each year of service.” Their is no mention of an employee starting over at Step 0/1 if they are promoted. The notion is ludicrous and senior people being promoted would actually receive pay cuts. More responsibility less pay, don’t see the logic in that…

3) See that better management is put in place in the Portsmouth Police Department. I have already made posts about that in the past. To update everyone that is not already aware, Portsmouth has a new Chief of Police, Edward G. Hargis. Thankfully he is from the “outside” and was not one of the people that applied from within. He is already making changes and from what I hear holding some of his executive staff far more accountable then the previous Chief. I am hoping that accountability, ethics and professionalism become the words of the day under the new Chief.

4) Radio System problems are being addressed, very slowly but plans call for a multi-million dollar Motorola Smartnet Simulcast site in Churchland to address the considerable problems Public Safety personel having in communicating using the current generation of portable radios. I am looking into additional details because I am now assigned to work Churchland several days a week and find the radio problem to be of serious concern for officer safety. I have used the new car and fixxed base repeaters that have been installed in some of the police cars and at several sites in the Churchland area. I am not impressed overall with the functionallity of the repeaters. They are a step in the right direction but they have significant short comings. Portsmouth needs a simucast site in Churchland to correct the problems and make it safe for all the city employees that rely on the system for communications. I hope and pray that some public safety official does not have to die to have the radio system short comings addressed.

This was my first post in many months and I have a couple other issues that I will be making posts about in the future but with my current constraints I will not be able to maintain the same level of posts as before.

Portsmouth is in financial crisis and appears to be the first city in this area to start laying off employees claiming budgetary shortfalls. Could these layoff’s have been prevented? It’s a complex question, but if you look at some of the previous actions of the Portsmouth City Council and the City of Portsmouth Upper Level Management the question might actually be yes.

After significant research several things become clear. First, the City Council saw fit to give the city’s executive management huge pay increases over the past 10 years compared to the rank and file general employee’s including the city’s Public Safety employee’s. Click here to see the Portsmouth Pay Increases Comparison 1998 through 2008 which documents the huge pay increases the City Manager, City Attorney and others in the upper levels of management have reaped in the past 10 years while the rank and file were given pittance pay increases. The data for the graph was obtained from the City of Portsmouth via FOIA and was contained in their own pay plans that the City Council approves each year placing them by ordinance into the city code.

I learned a long time ago that a true leader leads by example and is willing to make sacrifices for their people to see that they are taken care of. That has not been the case in Portsmouth. While the rank and file employees which include Public Safety have had to struggle, work second jobs or part time work to cover their family expenses or were forced to leave Portsmouth and seek employment elsewhere the city management has received significant pay increases. This certainly demonstrates what the Portsmouth City Council thinks about their rank and file employees that do the real work of the city. They don’t…

I am currently working on a study of the cost to City of Portsmouth tax payers every time a Portsmouth Police Officer is forced to leave employment because economically they simply can not afford to stay in Portsmouth.  I don’t have all the numbers crunched nor all the records I have FOIA’d from Portsmouth yet but hope to soon. My estimate from what I have already is that each officer that leaves costs the tax payers in excess of $50,000. You multiply that out with the number of officers that have been leaving and you could have had the funds to provide pay increases over the years. The city has continued to take away benefits from the Police Officers such as take home police cars. They used that as a recruiting tool for years. They would say hey, “we don’t pay as much as some of the other cities but after 5 years you are entitled to a take home police car with city gas to burn.” That benefit was taken away last year from many of the officers resulting in what amounted to a pay cut to many police officers who are already struggling to make ends meet.

A contributing factor to the current financial crisis is the continued trend over previous years to spend, spend, spend but not build up a contingency fund to cover just such a financial crisis. The city has an obligation to provide for a functional and safe court facility but instead they have invested in hotels and traffic circles.

The city contends that it was the consultant’s independent study that determined the positions were not needed.  That very well may be the case but unfortunately the city has no choice but to lay people off because of poor fiscal decisions made in the past. Had it not been a financial crisis because of poor decisions the city would not now have to place dozens of it’s employee’s into a crisis of their own. Portsmouth claims that it’s work force is a family, if that’s the case I suggest they start making sacrifices at the top to help some of their family at the bottom. The increased salaries given to management over the past decade were not even comparatively close to the raises the rank and file employees have received. The amounts involved actually could fully fund a number of the positions that were eliminated or provide funding to transition those employees to other positions within the city.

I received word yesterday that Interim Police Chief William Corvello resigned for the second and likely last time from his position with the City of Portsmouth Click here to see Chief Corvello’s second and likely last resignation letter. Having dealt with him personally during the previous months about matters related to my termination and grievance I have nothing but positive things to say about the Chief.

He is a “law enforcement officer” of the highest class who believes in doing things the right way, with honesty and integrity. I have no doubt some of his experiences with the current administration have left a bad taste in his mouth but I have no doubt he gave it his 110% during his tenure. I will have one last opportunity to meet with him on Monday as that is my final step in my grievance process and the last step in trying to get reinstated into the position Chief Long and City Manager Chandler terminated me from back in April. I have no expectations going into the meeting but one, that the person representing the City (Chief Corvello) has no ulterior motive, that he will do what he feels is the right thing to do and say. Unlike others in the executive staff of the Police Department that have personal agenda’s I firmly believe that Chief Corvello’s agenda was to fix the problems in the Department and to see that everyone at every level was treated fairly, honestly and that no one was shown any favoritism.

I have not made any posts in a while as I have been waiting on several Freedom of Information Act responses from various departments of the City of Portsmouth. My current project is to make an accurate estimation of the cost to train a newly hired Police recruit from the date of hire till the recruit is certified and released to Uniform Patrol as a fully trained productive officer.  Going hand-in-hand with that project is another one that will demonstrate the inequity between the pay raises given regular and public safety employee’s over the previous 10 years and the high level city management such as the City Manager, City Attorney etc etc.

Sometimes we live for the small victories in life. I received notification two days ago that the Virginia Unemployment Commission (VEC) ruled in my favor when I recently applied for unemployment benefits. After a telephone hearing, exchange of documents the Commission ruled that “The charge of misconduct is questionable” and that I am “Entitled to benefits”.

More to follow in the next week or so …

Below is the latest radio spot from the Portsmouth Fraternal Order of Police Lodge. They are attempting to generate support among the citizens of Portsmouth for better pay for the Portsmouth Police Officers. I fully support this endeavor and wish them well on a quest that typically falls on deaf ears in the Portsmouth City Council.

Over the previous 10 years the City of Portsmouth has provided significant pay raises to the executive staff of the City, i.e. City Manager, City Attorney etc. The pay raises given to the general and public safety employees has been significantly less during the same period. I am in the process of collecting and processing 10 years worth of City of Portsmouth Pay Plans to document this inequitable distribution of pay raises. Hopefully I will have that post ready in the next week or so.

Click to the right to hear the latest FOP Radio Spot Portsmouth FOP Radio Spot Number 2

If after you read my post or listen to the ad and want to help out, click the link below to go to the Portsmouth FOP page that has all the contact information to voice your concern to the Portsmouth City Council.

Email sent a little after 8pm tonight indicates that Chief Corvello met with City Council and they addressed his concerns. He has decided to stay.

That’s good news because the City of Portsmouth was not going to find anyone of Chief Corvello’s caliber, stature or experience.

Thanks Chief Corvello for staying ..

Click here for a copy of the email; Interim Chief William Corvello will be staying in Portsmouth

I had a good laugh today when I received an email with an audio attachment. It’s one of those funny things that’s sad. It starts off as a recruiting ad, kinda, but is actually a very well done parody of the current retention problems facing the Portsmouth Police Department. The Portsmouth Fraternal Order of Police (FOP) lodge had the ad made and is going to be airing it on various radio stations starting Monday.

I received permission to place it on my blog from one of the Officers of the Portsmouth FOP.

The Department has one very positive note for the junior officers that are hired. Once trained, then Department of Criminal Justice Services (DCJS) certified Basic Law Enforcement Officers they can then find a job at any other Commonwealth of Virginia Law Enforcement Agency. A little over 10 years ago the City of Portsmouth changed their retirement system from a city run pension plan to the Commonwealth of Virginia “Virginia Retirement System” (VRS). By doing this they made a city employees retirement “portable”. You can now leave Portsmouth, go to any other Virginia state agency or municipality that is also under VRS and continue on with all your time from Portsmouth credited to you under your new agency for your retirement.

When you look at the pay differential of the local police departments (click here for area police pay comparison) you will see that Portsmouth ranks at the very bottom for pretty much everything. The question then becomes, why would a Portsmouth Junior Police Officer stick around in Portsmouth when they can go almost anywhere and get a pay raise in the thousands of dollars. Given the turmoil, mismanagement, politics, unfair treatment, inadequate compensation and poor working conditions how can you blame them for leaving? You can’t, but that doesn’t seem to concern the City of Portsmouth. The starting salary of a Portsmouth Police Officer is in the neighborhood of $30,000. It takes about a year from start to finish to train one to become a patrol officer and get them DCJS certified. You are talking about losing an investment of about $40,000-$50,000 every time a trained police officer leaves the department. Because Portsmouth Officers do more with less, handle more varied types of police cases due to the high crime rate (click here for Hampton Roads cities crime statistics comparison for 2006) they are far more experienced in a few short years then most of the other departments in the area and are popular applicants with the other departments. These departments avoid the $40,000-$50,000 cost to train a new officer and the applicant gets a pay raise in the thousands of dollars depending on the department that hires them.

Click the link below to listen to the ad, it’s accurate, funny and sad.. Portsmouth FOP Radio Recruiting Ad

If after you read my post or listen to the ad and want to help out, click the link below to go to the Portsmouth FOP page that has all the contact information to voice your concern to the Portsmouth City Council.