WILSON VOWS TO END POLICE HIRING EXAM
Mayoral challenger Willie Wilson vowed Tuesday to eliminate the police hiring exam and “temporarily” raise the retirement age for Chicago police officers from 63 to 67 to fill 2,000 police vacancies and flood the city’s 22 depleted police districts with additional officers.
During a luncheon address to the City Club of Chicago, the millionaire businessman unveiled what he called his common sense plan to deliver Chicago from violent crime.
Some of his ideas — dividing Chicago into four separate areas, each with its own homegrown police superintendent — have been heard before. So has Wilson’s proposal to relax policies on vehicular and foot chases that, he said, are too “restrictive,” making officers fearful of pursuits and emboldening criminals who know they won’t be chased.
But Wilson also proposed new ideas — some certain to be controversial.
“We will increase the number of officers in each of the 22 police districts. Currently, there are 2,000 vacant positions for sworn officers. I would do the following to fill these positions: We will eliminate the hiring exam. Reassign administrative personnel to fill duties. Create an auxiliary police unit staffed by retired officers. Rehire officers who have already left the Chicago Police Department … be able to transfer them into certain positions that will protect us,” Wilson said.
“Temporarily, we need to raise the retirement age of police officers from 63 to 67 until we get this problem under control. I will ask them to help us out. Afterward, if they want to go back and retire — well that’s all fine, too.”
Wilson also would raise police salaries; reverse merit promotions that mayoral challenger Paul Vallas has derisively branded the “friends and family plan”; restore police morale by drawing the line between “mistakes and misconduct” to prove to officers that the city “has their backs”; and put armed officers on CTA trains and buses to lure back riders.
“I won’t fire a police officer because they made a mistake,” he told the City Club audience.
“I will be a mayor who will keep Chicago safe. Law enforcement will feel comfortable that I got their back.”