November 2010

By Greg Corrales

You simply have to read the quarterly report submitted to the Police Commission by the Office of Citizen Complaints (OCC). It will have your head spinning by the time you finish - here‘s a sample excerpt taken verbatim from their 3rd Quarter Report:

Section III: Investigation of Cases

“Ain’t they virtuous? Don’t they take good care of the City? Is not their constant vigilance and efficiency shown in the fact that roughs and rowdies are awed into good conduct?”
- Mark Twain describing the 1866 SFPD.

It’s hard to remember a day more important to police labor’s future – and, by extension, to the future of all public employee labor – than the approaching Tuesday of November 2, 2010. For it is on that day that we will know whether the citizens of both San Francisco and San Jose believe that police officers and other public employees are equitably compensated or receive too much. There is simply no other way to put it.

Where should one really begin with a conversation about police suicide? How does one approach a subject that for far too long has been regarded as “taboo” within the police community? How does one cope with the reality that within the past year our department has suffered the loss of three members (2 active and one recently retired) due to suicide and the attempted suicide by another two members? It should be noted that all incidents referred to above included the use of a handgun during the acts or attempted acts.

There is little point in avoiding the serious conversation surrounding the three recent suicides that have taken place in our police family over the past year. It is a topic rarely discussed publicly by police administrators because no department wants to acknowledge it has a greater problem than any other law enforcement organization. The fact is that we have seen an epidemic in suicides across the country relating to public safety personnel. I have been told that seven firefighters in Chicago alone have taken their own lives over the past year.