The New Czar in Town
Monday, March 16th, 2009 at 3:35 pm | By: MrSpof
Yet Kerlikowske is no get-tough-on-drugs zealot. When asked to help design a new police station as police chief in Port St. Lucie, Fla., Kerlikowske recommended making room for a library instead of a jail. He has long been a proponent of community policing, which he defines as “problem solving, decision making … and the utilizing and leveraging of the community.” And as police chief in Seattle, he instructed his officers to stand by during the annual HempFest, while thousands of civil disobedients smoked pot in the streets.
With this résumé, Kerlikowske might look like Bill O’Reilly’s worst nightmare (or Keith Olbermann’s secret crush). But Kerlikowske’s decisions were based on prudence and case-by-case analysis, not political ideology. In the case of the Port St. Lucie police station, Kerlikowske did not refuse to build a jail because of any anti-incarceration views but because “we [already] have a nice jail.” Though some dogmatists continued to decry community policing as “soft on crime,” Kerlikowske supported it—because community policing works.
via – Slate “The New Czar in Town“
Very promising indeed! One of big takeaways from this article is in the second paragraph above: politicians or appointed officials being fearful of appearing ’soft on crime’. So, what has being ‘hard on crime’ accomplished for us? Isn’t it time that we apply what actually works rather than our government being full of sound and fury, signifying nothing? (If you have to steal, steal from the best. Thanks Will!)
Topics: Chief Gil Kerlikowske, Drug Czar, ONDCP, Slate
