New Haven Independent

Posted by: robn | November 8, 2007 8:53 AM

A friend of mine was recently burgled and the police response was to ask if he had insurance. I'm consistantly (probably naively) surprised that police officers refuse to fingerprint for burgleries and recovered stolen cars. I once had a car stoilen and recovered and there was a clearly visible clean print right by the door handle. If they let me into their database , even I could have found the theives.

And they want a paramilitary vehicle? Forget it!!

Posted by: New Haven Tea Party | November 8, 2007 10:50 AM

The city's never ending search for more money continues. These two ideas get the blue ribbon for two of the dumbest ideas ever.

1. $200 license fee for each new alarm installed. Many alarm systems only cost $200 - if you get aggressive and add a lot of windows or doors, it could go up to $500 - 800. So, these cops want to charge somewhere between 40% and 100% tax on homeowners who want an alarm system. Background checks? The alarm companies are responsible for their own employees and any damage they may or may not cause.

2. When in the last 25 years, has New Haven ever needed an assault vehicle like what these cops envision? I don't care if it's a grant or not - we need a $200,000 assault vehicle like we need a hole in the head. They haven't even discussed the training expense, maintenance expense. Geeez...

Instead of having these braintrusts sitting around thinking this stuff up - get off their butts and get in a patrol car and start doing real community policing.

These fines are equally stupid - the NHPD has a policy of sending two cop cars to every alarm call, even when a phone call to the homeowner confirms there is not a problem. Start with sending only one - and start by accepting the word of the homeowner there is not an issue.

What happens when your kid actually opens the back door with the alarm on - and it goes off. The family is now fined for that. Get real.

Posted by: New Haven Tea Party | November 8, 2007 10:54 AM

Hey...with the new Bearcat...the NHPD could also roll up on flour in a parking lot. And put their zootsuits on in safety.

Posted by: Albert Vosburn | November 8, 2007 11:23 AM

A Bearcat for New Haven? If it weren't so outrageous, it would be a joke!

Posted by: nfjanette | November 8, 2007 11:44 AM

I understand ROBN's point about the lack of police resources (interest?) in pursuing detective work for burglary cases. This most likely stems from a lack of personnel to handle such work; as you know, the department has been hard-pressed to handle basic public safety with the available staff.

The police officers have presented scenarios in which the proposed vehicle would be an aid, so this doesn't appear to be fanciful spending. If there are funds available for the BearCat, and they can't be directed toward other important equipment, why not make the purchase? In general, I believe it's a win all around to provide the best equipment and training available to the police.

Posted by: on whalley | November 8, 2007 11:50 AM

Is anyone else creeped out or concerned with the NHPD's pattern of ignoring petty crimes, referring to the wave of shootings as a high risk game of tag but all the while preparing for some grand civil disturbance/mass casualty type of event?

It's like they're saying we shouldn't care about a break-in or a murder because a police state is on the way and we'll all be safe as pie in bubble wrap.

I guess most people will wait until a big fence starts getting built around the Hill before they start sharing in my paranoia.

Doesn't the Hartford PD have a hovercraft? For all those sea to land assaults they use to fight crime I guess.

Posted by: dylan | November 8, 2007 12:00 PM

Without getting into all sorts of issues at the PD, I do imagine that the cache of having such a piece of a equipment could certainly be a boon for recruitment. And that's certainly not a bad thing.

Posted by: cedarhillresident | November 8, 2007 12:03 PM

Have the Yale police pay for it.

And the new alarm fine is a very good thing.

Posted by: Edward_H | November 8, 2007 1:25 PM

Nice that the Feds might give us back some of our tax money in the form of a grant to purchase a Bearcat , but more information is needed on the long term costs not covered in the grant. Especially the cost of training the police on how to use it as well as maintaining it.

The $200 license fee for an alarm system is ridiculous. Homeowners who take an active interest in protecting their homes and families now have to pay $200 extra? All of the piddling little fees and taxes in New Haven just adds incentive for anyone who can afford it to up and leave. I don't have a problem with fines for false alarms but $250 dollars is excessive. If I recall correctly from an article I read awhile ago not even Beverly Hills charges people that much for false alarms.

Posted by: on whalley | November 8, 2007 1:37 PM

Oh man! It just occurred to me.

They could use the money to build two thirds of a bus stop!!

Or, sell the bus stops to some other sucker city and buy 7 "BearCats."

Albert is right. If this wasn't so outrageous (or such disgustingly commonplace waste) it would be funny.

Posted by: Been Called Worse | November 8, 2007 3:39 PM

Edward - RTFA. The $200 alarm registration fee is for each ALARM COMPANY to pay as a licensing fee for doing business in the city, not for the alarm system subscriber.

Posted by: DAFeder | November 8, 2007 4:02 PM

For about $125,000 the NHPD could get themselves a beautiful 1923 Stutz BearCat roadster -- and it would probably be just as useful.

Except if it were stolen, and nobody took prints or a proper police report. Which drives me crazy: people get all excited about the "broken windows" policing, but only when it includes nice, middle-class-white-people-reassuring, fascist-looking tactics. (Hello, Giuliani administration.) Isn't printing a stolen car at least as good a way to preempt more serious crime as hustling panhandlers and turnstyle-jumpers?

On Whalley and CedarHillRez -- right on. Tea Party -- seems like thee alarm companies would pay a single annual fee, not per alarm. And wouldn't you like nuisance wasters of city funds to bear the $$ burden, rather than taxes? Surely you're not that fanatical about "slaying the government beast"? Maybe you'd feel better after a ride in the bitchin' new 1923 Stutz BearCat.

David

Posted by: FairHavener (still me) | November 8, 2007 4:41 PM

The false alarm fine I can understand - I don't necessarily agree that it would work 100% of the time, as already pointed out, but at least it is based on an inkling of logic.

The $200 a year licensing fee for alarm companies is just one more tax that will be passed down to us. Well, I guess those of us with alarms could just give them up to avoid the tax? I mean, this is a pretty safe town and the police do a great job. Alarms are really just for peace of mind anyway - a sort of luxury. I guess you could just call this a luxury tax.

ROBN, the police said the exact same thing to us after we were burglarized ("just call the insurance co."). About a month or so after moving in to our new house someone broke in and went into the room where my pregnant wife was sleeping. They stole her purse (credit cards, money, IDs etc), a set of keys to our house and cars, and her cell phone (I was out of town). It took the NHPD, fine department that it is, TWO DAYS to show up.

There were smeary fingerprints all over the window the burglar climbed through. The burglar's footprints were all the way around the house. The cop didn't even want to see the window - let alone take some prints. He was to busy telling me about how his parents and aunts and uncles used to live in what was now my house and all of his memories of it. Yeah, what words are there to describe that?

I guess if these freaking geniuses had a BearCat they would have been there lickety split. HA!

As for their points on why we need this BearCat:

""It's a cure-all for what we don't have and are going to need in the future," Esposito said."

Why? What exactly are you planning? Is there something you guys know that we don't know? What do you mean a "cure-all for what we don't have"? I think what we "don't have" is the "need" for a ridiculous boy toy BearCat.

Oh, but you say if only you had one for the West Rock Park suicide everything would have been different. Give me a break. If that is the best you can come up with then I am sorry, you are just too ridiculous to be taken seriously. Couldn't you have come up with at least a story about the most dangerous bank robbery in town, or gang violence, anything?

Anyway, the last thing these incompetents need is a BearCat, for all the reasons already posted - especially new haven tea party's point about "training expense, maintenance expense", and don't forget OPERATING expense. These clowns would rack up a fuel bill that would make their overtime look like a joke.

I can just imagine all the "locked in a BearCat with so-and-so" fart jokes now.

Maybe, and I mean MAYBE, we should let them get it. But, only so they could sell it to buy new bikes and new shoes so they can start community policing again. (NHPD apologists, this is a joke.)

Posted by: New Haven Tea Party | November 8, 2007 5:11 PM

Somebody clarified this story. It used to say $200 per alarm installed....$200 license fee per company for a year long license. That's not bad - these guys get a better deal than the parking lot owners who pay property taxes, business license fee of $130 - 340 per spot and now the fake trolley tax. It's a three-fer.

Posted by: Paul Bass | November 8, 2007 5:41 PM

Good spot, Tea Party! Joe Avery called in a correction mid-afternoon.

Posted by: FairHavener (still me) | November 8, 2007 6:06 PM

Oh darn it, I forgot the best part. Get a load of this:

""We want to make sure, as a city, that we're doing business with companies that are legitimate," Assistant Chief Stephanie Redding (pictured with Avery), who joined Avery later on, told aldermen."

Are you kidding? You mean by legitimate "companies that donate to campaigns"? If an alarm company was behind all their customers' break-ins, don't you think they would go out of business on their own? And besides who are you to decide my alarm company? (Like NH Tea Party already stated: "Background checks? The alarm companies are responsible for their own employees and any damage they may or may not cause.") I could take Redding's argument seriously if I was sure "the city" was legitimate.

""Also, there's an onus on the homeowner. You have to be comfortable hiring someone to come into your home.""

Oh, the onus, it is so great. Maybe "the city" should start planning my meals too. "The city" could maybe help me pick out my clothes. How about turning this effort towards making me feel comfortable walking down the street? Or, better, making me feel comfortable in my home.

Hey wait, didn't "the city" send McGrath and Uncle Stan into peoples' homes? At least I know I can trust "the cities" standards. HA!

Posted by: FairHavener (still me) | November 8, 2007 6:07 PM

Oh darn it, I forgot the best part. Get a load of this:

""We want to make sure, as a city, that we're doing business with companies that are legitimate," Assistant Chief Stephanie Redding (pictured with Avery), who joined Avery later on, told aldermen."

Are you kidding? You mean by legitimate "companies that donate to campaigns"? If an alarm company was behind all their customers' break-ins, don't you think they would go out of business on their own? And besides who are you to decide my alarm company? (Like NH Tea Party already stated: "Background checks? The alarm companies are responsible for their own employees and any damage they may or may not cause.") I could take Redding's argument seriously if I was sure "the city" was legitimate.

""Also, there's an onus on the homeowner. You have to be comfortable hiring someone to come into your home.""

Oh, the onus, it is so great. Maybe "the city" should start planning my meals too. "The city" could maybe help me pick out my clothes. How about turning this effort towards making me feel comfortable walking down the street? Or, better, making me feel comfortable in my home.

Hey wait, didn't "the city" send McGrath and Uncle Stan into peoples' homes? At least I know I can trust "the cities" standards. HA!

Posted by: Popeye | November 8, 2007 8:00 PM

Another solution. Do the same as many other cities. Put the full burden on the monitoring sources. Remember, all requests for alarm response is from alarm companies, not the taxpayer alarm user. Almost none of those requests are for known emergencies, just "unknown" alarm signals that require site inspections (police response). Stop responding to requests from alarm companies, who use your police to deliver their private services; Or charge the alarm company, not the alarm user, for these site inspections. If they do not pay, pull their "operating permit". Let the cops do the public service not private service.

Posted by: robn | November 8, 2007 9:54 PM

I have an idea...
Why not apply for a federal grant for $201 for each officer. Spend $200 on a digital camera, $1 on a tube of crazy glue and then the NHPD will finally be able to take f@

Posted by: Chris Gray | November 8, 2007 10:58 PM

Pardon the historian in me, but I can think of at least two incidents in those 25 years where the police would have justifiably used the armored personnel carrier (let's call it what it is).

The morning June 24, 1993, when the mail bomb seriously injured Prof. Gelertner, which could easily have signaled a wave of attacks is one. I walked past as I walked to work at the Yale Co-op somewhat afterward.

Another is the day explosives long left over from a radical group some of which I seem to remember had been used some in an attempted prison break in Brooklyn. It seems to me one might be concerned, after such a discovery, that armed people might be about ready to protect it. That was in a garage on Dwight Street behind St. Paul's U.A.M.E. Church on Chapel Street, the building where I worked at the Connecticut Elder newspaper in 1987.

In neither case would the vehicle actually have proved useful, but I can understand the humanitarian value in forearming against the worst-case scenario. It is tough enough having a job you could just get run down doing without facing literal explosives.

On the other hand, my eldest brother was the commander of the tanks you no doubt have sometime seen a picture of during the May Day weekend in 1970. He once told me that Chief Farrell asked him, after the bombing of the Yale Whale, if the police department could use one of the personnel carriers. He did not laugh in his face, but he certainly chuckled when he told me about it.

At the time he told me, the State was trying to prosecute an innocent man for the murder of Penny Serra on evidence provided by the department (probably still under Farrell) clearly proving that he didn't do it

Not the Yale police department, but the now, almost certainly, internationally expanding non-profit Yale brand (so nice of them to add our quaint plantation city's name to their medical brand) should pay, if one should even be bought, for a Virginia Tech-style mass murder. They are as likely to be the scene as any college, maybe more so due to the stress of prestige.

Just don't allow them to use it in labor disputes.

Posted by: Bill Saunders | November 9, 2007 2:11 AM

Hmmmmm......

Federal Grants for Armored Paramilitary Vehicles......

This is the stuff Police States are made of.

Maybe someone upstairs DOES know something that we don't, Fairhavener.

Posted by: Edward_H | November 9, 2007 10:35 PM

Been Called Worse

Edward - RTFA. The $200 alarm registration fee is for each ALARM COMPANY to pay as a licensing fee for doing business in the city, not for the alarm system subscriber.

I did read the article. The information in the article was corrected after I posted. Which is why others posted the same sort of outrage. Get a grip and stop trying to use this forum as a way to feel good about yourself with pitiful attempts at oneupsmanship. Feel free to email me with more uninformed comments at sandain666@gmail.com since I won't be addressing you any further in this forum

Posted by: Frank K | November 10, 2007 10:13 AM

I wish the police would actually show up and try to investigate when our property is stolen or vandalized. What happened to "livable city"?
The cops need to be out on the streets where they can see what's happening in the neighborhoods, not in armored vehicles!