During the talk about the police cars at last week's meeting, Alderman David Wallstrom said he had tried to discuss equipment needs with the police department but got little response.
That struck me as odd, since I attended the Public Safety Committee meeting where Wallstrom floated the idea of cutting the cars and he got much the same response from Lt. Geno and Capt. Tucker that the full board got when they went ahead and made the cut.
Sunday, Wallstrom clarified that while he was able to sit down one-on-one with the heads of DPW and the rec department to discuss their equipment needs, he had trouble getting the same sort of access to police leadership. He said he heard loud and clear the message that the police feel they need the new cars.
"I understand they believe that," he said. "I don't think that's constructive. I wanted to know, at what time you would accept you can't get two new cars this year ... I've never had that conversation. I just heard 'It's just not safe, it's just not safe.'"
Might that mean it really isn't safe?
"To me, safety is brakes, tires and ball joints," he said. "That's not a new car. You also could argue a dump truck with a hole in it and carbon monoxide fumes leaking up isn't safe. That's what DPW was dealing with."
Wallstrom argued that a small equipment fund means the board had to prioritize.
Meanwhile, one of my coldhearted taskmasters editors asked me if there was any conventional wisdom on when to replace police cars. A decent question, and a few minutes of Googling produced the following:
Prospect Heights, Ill. surveyed 24 other towns in their area and found an average replacement schedule of 2.5 years.
Oklahamo City apparently waited until their newest black-and-whites were five years old and their oldest patrol cars were 12. Then they replaced 237 of their 575 cars over a two-year period.
This article in Police Magazine discusses monitoring cars and replacing them when needed, while this online-only companion piece says "Most departments cycle a car out after it's been driven 100,000 miles. But this shouldn't be the only factor you consider."
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