(Feb. 8, 2010, updated Feb. 9) -- Long Beach Vice Mayor Val Lerch says he was accompanying Congresswoman Laura Richardson (D., Carson-LB) on a recent bus tour of North Long Beach Council when, to his embarrassment, apparent gang members were openly smoking marijuana in a neighborhood touted for routing crime and blight.
We quote Vice Mayor Lerch's words below, delivered extemporaneously at the Feb. 2, 2010 Council meeting (context following quote):
Vice Mayor Val Lerch: Last Saturday [Jan. 30], I took Congresswoman Laura Richardson and her Washington staff on a tour of my district in a bus. And as we're driving down Downey St., I'm championing what we did on Andy Street, how great Andy Street had been changed and turned around over the last four years.
And as we pull up and stop the bus with a congresswoman with her entire staff, there's four gangbangers standing in front blowing a joint, and came towards the bus, so much that Laura Richardson says 'let's get out of here.'
That's what I'm seeing begin to happen in my neighborhood. This is urgency we have to get to at this point in time...I don't want to delay this...
Mayor Bob Foster: Anecdotal stories like that are interesting but, you know, I've seen the crime stats. This [Police] Department has done a great job. Crime's actually been going down, not up, and I'm gettin' tired of hearing that it's constantly going up. It is not in this city. I agree we have to have adequate staffing levels, but let's not try to scare people into this. Let's do this in a rational way...
For Congresswoman Richardson's statement (issued Feb. 9) on what took place, click here.
The City Council comments came during an item co-agendized by Vice Mayor Lerch seeking ways to hasten the start of a replenishment Police Academy class to replace retiring/exiting police officers. In September 2009, the Council voted (unanimously) not to fund a Police Academy class in FY10 and also voted to cut 76 officers (59 sworn + 17 recruits) in FY10. (Mayor Foster and city management originally proposed to cut 88 officers, from which the Council restored 12.)
In its current FY10 budget, the City of Long Beach (L.A. County's second largest city) provides a per capita budgeted police level available for citywide duties of roughly 1.8 officers per thousand residents. By comparison, Los Angeles budgets roughly 2.4.-2.5 officers per thousand, and Signal Hill provides closer to 3.0.
During the Feb. 2, 2010 Long Beach City Council item, city management indicated that it plans a replenishment Police Academy class during FY 2011.
Vice Mayor Lerch's statement, and Mayor Foster's response, can accessed on demand as part of LBReport.com's extended coverage of what occurred during the Feb. 2 agenda item, click here.
