Chicago’s daunting budget crisis will require the mayor and the City Council to make some difficult decisions in the days ahead. While we recognize cuts will be needed, we urge the mayor and the City Council to invest in the Chicago Police Department’s technology systems, facilities and civilian infrastructure necessary for reform.
These efforts are long overdue. The latest independent monitor report shows CPD struggling to achieve full compliance with consent decree reform mandates. While many CPD policies have been strengthened, additional changes to successfully implement them are needed. The budget crisis presents the opportunity.
First, the city must hire more civilians for project management and data analytics and give senior management professionals the authority to drive change on behalf of police Superintendent Larry Snelling. This will free up sworn police who are currently assigned to administrative tasks.
Second, new and better data and information system technology is needed to demonstrate consent decree compliance, which right now the department cannot do.
CPD desperately needs a new records management system to replace antiquated systems that waste police resources by requiring officers to fill out multiple reports with redundant information. Poor record-keeping can also lead to unfair detention of suspects, breeding mistrust in the system, and undermine prosecutions, making the city less safe
Many of CPD’s operational facilities are also in need of attention. Two stations in high-crime areas, the 3rd and 11th Districts, are dilapidated and long overdue for replacement. At a time when police morale and retention are growing concerns and officer wellness is a mandated area of reform under the consent decree, modern police stations are critical to improving working conditions.
While the department’s homicide clearance rate has improved in recent years, it remains low relative to that of other big cities. That is not just a matter of needing more detectives. Solving and prosecuting crime also requires timely forensic analysis of evidence.
Yet, Chicago is the largest department in the country without its own forensics lab to process physical evidence. CPD must wait in line with every other local police department in Illinois for forensic evidence to be processed and analyzed by the Illinois State Police lab. These technology and facilities costs can be treated as capital costs and do not have to be absorbed by the operating budget.
Finally, Chicago’s traditional methods of deployment, in which officers are not supervised by the same sergeant every day, conflicts with well-settled policy in the field of constitutional policing. We must have continuity of supervision to evaluate and improve sworn officer performance and ensure fidelity to wellness and training standards.
Crime reductions and reforms in Los Angeles and New York were achieved through substantial investment in professionalization of operations, which resulted in a philosophical shift in how they police within their communities and in how they manage performance within their police departments.
In Chicago, that philosophical shift should first be represented by training officers to identify and solve problems — sometimes with enforcement, and other times with referral to social service agencies. Second, we should professionalize the administration of CPD through civilian staffing and infrastructure that simultaneously improve performance of mission objectives — most urgently reductions in violent crime — while improving performance management, which will speed the pace of reform.
We are all in for public safety. Chicago has a large and growing network of community violence intervention organizations working to prevent gun violence. We also have a deeply activated civic sector offering real solutions to our fiscal challenges and significant resources to help meet public safety challenges.
But the city is the indispensable lead partner for our collective success. Government budgeting is not just about balancing books — it also is about achieving outcomes. And the worst possible outcome is that city budgeteers simply hack into the public safety budget to close a fiscal gap. Even if the budget crisis necessitates staffing cuts, it is critical that cuts be done in a strategic manner that will improve both mission and reform objectives.
We respectfully urge the mayor and the City Council to wield the budgetary scalpel for the purpose of reconstructive surgery rather than amputation. Let’s ensure that scarce resources are put to their best and highest use and set CPD up for long-term success by fostering professionalized constitutional policing that will make Chicago the safest big city in America.
Joe Ferguson is president of the Civic Federation. Bob Boik is senior vice president for public safety at the Civic Committee of the Commercial Club.
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