EX- TOP COP MCCARTHY ON HOW HE’D FIGHT CRIME AS MAYOR
Mayoral challenger Garry McCarthy vowed Monday to “eliminate political manipulation” of the Chicago Police Department and cancel plans to build a $ 95 million police academy in favor of restoring mental health clinics closed by Mayor Rahm Emanuel.
“This police academy is a shiny object that Rahm Emanuel can point to and say, ‘ I’m all about police reform.’ It’s for political purposes— not functional purposes, “McCarthy said.
“I’d use that $ 95 million to put social services and mental health centers back in communities that need them the most. Crime reduction is not just about the police. Everybody knows that.”
The police academy has become a symbol of Emanuel’s misplaced priorities, drawing fire from Chance the Rapper, Black Lives Matter and other groups operating under the # NoCopAcademy label. The coalition has argued that the money would be better spent on jobs, youth and education programs.
A fired Chicago police superintendent, McCarthy would seem an unlikely candidate to join the # NoCopAcademy crowd — until one considers he has condemned the driving force behind the police academy project: a U. S. Justice Department report triggered by the police shooting of Laquan McDonald. That report found CPD’s training to be sorely lacking.
“We exceeded the Illinois State Training Board’s recommendations and requirements for training. So if Chicago has a problem, the entire state of Illinois has a problem,” McCarthy said.
McCarthy has long accused Emanuel of “political manipulation and micro- management.” He has not provided specific evidence beyond claiming he was the victim of a political “witch hunt” engineered by top mayoral aides to mask the fact that the “entirety of that cover- up” of the Laquan McDonald shooting video “occurred at City Hall.”
On Monday, McCarthy was asked again for evidence of Emanuel’s “micro- management.”
“Four- and- a- half years of working for Rahm Emanuel,” he said. “I fought it [ and stayed on] because I loved my job and we were doing something really special.”
Emanuel responded by accusing McCarthy of having a totally different position as superintendent.
“So you should ask him: ‘ What changed?’” the mayor said.
Emanuel then ticked off the ways he claims to have led the fight against violent crime.
“To the 32,000 kids having a job this summer, that’s leadership. To the 115,000 kids that have after- school programs so they’re not on the streets, that’s leadership,” the mayor said.
“Adding 1,000 new officers to the Police Department is leadership.”
Mayoral challenger Paul Vallas has pledged to rebuild the Police Department to 14,000 officers — with 1,200 detectives and one sergeant for every 10 patrol officers— to erase years of “bad decisions” by Emanuel that, Vallas claims, contributed heavily to a surge in violent crime.
McCarthy is equally critical of that crime surge, pointing to the 332 additional Chicago murder victims over the last three years, compared to the three years before that, during his watch as police superintendent.
But he would not decide whether to hire more police officers until after a “workload analysis” of crimes and calls for service.
“We may not need 1,000 officers. I don’t know where that number comes from,” he said.
McCarthy’s crime reduction plan also includes:
Giving the superintendent— not the Police Board — final say over police discipline and asking a panel of experts to conduct a top- to- bottom review of the disciplinary system, including the role of the Civilian Office of Police Accountability.
The City Council’s Black Caucus is threatening to hold up ratification of any police contract that continues to make it “easy for officers to lie” by giving them 24 hours before providing a statement after a shooting and includes “impediments to accountability.” Those impediments include prohibiting anonymous complaints, allowing officers to change statements after reviewing video and requiring sworn affidavits.
But McCarthy said officers should be allowed to see the video before making a statement because police shootings are “traumatic events.”
“It’s not like they’re lying. They probably believe what they’re saying. The problem is, their minds are clouded by the aggressive nature of the adrenaline and the traumatic impact of those things.”
Using “data- driven policing strategies” to “reduce specialization,” abolish police task forces, and put more cops on the beat. McCarthy also promised to favor “anti- gang strategies” and crack down on illegal firearms.
“Data- driven policing relies on beat officers to do police work, not just to answer calls for service. . . . That’s why I broke up those task forces and put them into beats and districts. . . . We’ve reversed field. That’s why crime is up. Shootings are up and murders are up.”
Rolling out a community relations strategy that was created with public input but shelved by Emanuel in 2015.
Transferring dispatchers from the Office of Emergency Management and Communications to the Chicago Police Department to eliminate mistakes like the one made the night Chicago Police Officer Robert Rialmo fatally shot Quintonio LeGrier and neighbor/ bystander Bettie Jones.
Two 911 center dispatchers were suspended without pay for hanging up on LeGrier and failing to dispatch police in response to the young man’s pleas for help.