Message to my friends and former Co-Workers at the Portsmouth Police Department,

I just received word that the International Brotherhood of Police Officers National President David Holway and regional National Vice-President Paul Birks will be at the Norfolk Local meeting hall from 10am to 6pm on Tuesday the 9th of July. Norfolk Officer Mike McKenna is the Norfolk Local President and has invited Portsmouth Officers & Dispatchers to come over, meet the Union management and talk about getting Portsmouth on board as a IBPO Local. They can talk cost, benefits and what the organization has to offer. Some information can be found here at the IBPO Website.

I know many of you are members of the FOP and PBA but I think that IBPO has some things to offer that both those organizations don’t. Their is no reason you can’t be a member of more then one. The IBPO is more geared toward the Police Officer that works the beat or is a Detective and are not in management. Portsmouth can setup it’s own by-laws and allow Sergeants to join but as non-voting members.

Some locals allow Dispatchers to join. Given the situation with their staffing shortages and their low pay (which makes it difficult to recruit quality candidates) I think having them in the group will foster more cohesiveness and perhaps foster better relations between Police Officers and the 911 Center. I am extending an invitation to the Portsmouth Police Dispatchers to come to the meeting below the rank of Supervisor.

I am still working through my grievance with the department to return to work and hope that I will be successful. Chief Corvello is an impressive person and has been very fair in my discussions with him. He offered reinstatement if I was willing to take punishment for something that I did not do so I had to turn him down. Chief Corvello appears to be the first step in the right direction made by the City Management. This opportunity to organize a real labor union local for the Portsmouth Police Department just like the Fire Department currently has will show unity and perhaps give the officers and the dispatchers in the trenches a better opportunity to vocalize their issues with the management of the City of Portsmouth. We do not know what type of person we will end up with once the city hires Chief Corvello’s replacement and we could end up back at the same spot we were before Ed Long left. Now is the time to prepare for that contingency.

I am going to make every effort to be there the entire time. Mike said that they will provide food and beverages at the meeting.

The meeting will be held at Norfolk Local’s Office at 5307 E. Virginia Beach Blvd, Norfolk, VA 23502 phone: (757) 459-2232. This is on the right (south) side of Virginia Beach Blvd just prior to Military Hwy if your going toward Virginia Beach on the Blvd. Click on the link below for a Mapquest map;

IBPO Local Location

Please spread the word as this is short notice and I know some people are not going to get this email prior to the meeting.

Hope to see you there .. Jim

I was involved in one of my grievances on Friday at the Department Head level and Chief Edward Long was absent. Lieutenant Colonel Fremd acted in his place. City HR did not explain his absense to me or the Grievance Panel members.

Another mystery …

Funny title huh? Think that it’s a joke well it’s not. Back at the end of 2006 the city had new City Code books printed. I became aware of this as did people in Animal Control. We both asked for a copy of the new City Code book. Click City Code Book Email 113006 to Chief Long to see the response from the City Clerk’s Office.

Now as a Law Enforcement Officer you need to have knowledge of the laws you are tasked with enforcing. But again it becomes a money problem, it cost money to print code books and apparently the City of Portsmouth does not think that it’s important enough to fund such a outlandish concept as providing the City Code to the very people that are charged with enforcing it.

The City of Portsmouth and the Portsmouth Police Department also do not provide copies of the Commonwealth of Virginia Criminal or Traffic Code Books to the Police Officers either. Some of us used the internet access on our personal cellphones to lookup the State codes on the Commonwealth Website Link to the Code of Virginia . The City of Portsmouth uses “Municipal Code Corporation - Virginia” which is a private company to publish the City code on the internet. Because of the way the site is setup it is not easy to use via a cellphone.

The Portsmouth Police Department provides a City and State Code Cheat Sheet for it’s Officers to use. Unfortunately all the cheat sheet provides is the Code section and the title of the code. It does not contain any of the text of the code. For some codes that’s ok, they are not that complicated, i.e. Speeding 25 in a 35 MPH zone but others are very complicated and you really need access to the text to understand the law.

The department installed Mobile Data Terminals (MDT i.e. Laptop computers) in most of the Uniform Patrol vehicles a couple years ago. These terminals are tied into the Computer Aided Dispatch System (CAD), the Virginia Criminal Information Network (VCIN) and the National Crime Information Center (NCIC). The MDT’s are interfaced with these networks and are not allowed to have internet access for security reasons. Because of this restriction they are unable to use the MDT’s to query any of the resources available via the internet that provide access to the City or State code.

I find it remiss that again officers in the City of Portsmouth Police Department are not provided with the tools to accomplish their job and it comes down to money. It is extremely difficult to enforce laws if you are not provided with anything more then a “cheat sheet” to refer to. This issue puts the City of Portsmouth and the Portsmouth Police Department in a situation where there could be a liability concern. If an Officer makes an arrest which had he or she been able to read the code before making that arrest the officer might have chosen a different course of action.