This could never happen.

There were two bad apples, Curtis and Lewis, some great police officers were fired during the great witch hunt put on by that moron Chaires and the even bigger anti police idiot Brian Stratton. Great police officers who made one mistaker like Mike Brown were fired. Believe me it was a witch hunt and there is no love lost with Chaires leaving, most of the police force is saying good riddance to bad rubbish.

Well marincic - at least you're not lying about the Chief, the way you did in your last rant.

You claimed the Chief gave "his buddy" Dwayne Johnson a pass when, in fact, he Johnson forced out by the Chief. As part of a plea agreement, he resigned - as did most of the other officers you claim were the targets of a witch hunt. Question - waht makes you assume Johnson and Chaires were buddies?

And, re: your consistent lie about the Chief ending proactive policing - he introduced the concept of directed patrol the Department's de facto anti crime unit.

But, for some reason, you seem to enjoy targeting this one specific law enforcement executive, while licking the boots of bob hamilton and being an apologist for police officers who committed criminal acts. So enjoy and keep up the good work.

Actually cfield Johnson and Chaires were great friends and the only reason he is out is because under the circumstances he could not protect him this time. It was no secret that Johnson slept on the job, that is why nobody would partner with him. Chaires DID end proactive policing, FYI I know quite a few police officers and if you think Chaires was good for SPD you are sadly mistaken. There were some officers that were kicked off the force that should not have been fired. I don't lick anyones boots and I don't fall for the Gazette lies either.

Wmarincic

You are lying. Their relationship was supervisor - employee. They never spent any time outside of work. Stop getting your info from Hamilton's stooges would be a good start. They have not communicated since DJ was suspended.

Fact - the Chief implemented Directed Patrol was a member of that team. And this adminstration has shifted their philosophy to a proactive strategy.

Your only pathetic counter argument is using caps.

Note to marinicic - just stop lying.

Call me a liar to my face you no nothing POS. You are wrong and you are the liar and I will say it to your face toughguy.

BTW there are lots of guys on the job that don't spend time outside of work but it does not mean that there is not a relationship. Where do you get your information from, certainly not anyone who knows anything.

cfield,

I just checked with someone else and was told that Chaires did not know about Johnson. It is still my opinion that he did because everyone knew about Johnson, not to say that Johnson was not a great cop. I believe that Chaires knew but he had to do something so as not to get destroyed by Kathleen Moore and the Gazette and also because he kissed up to that dirtbag Stratton.

Maricncic - I won't even respond to the childish "say it to my face" - you'll have to take my word for it - I would have no problem saying that to your face.

Let me get this right - you brag about your sources within the Department but when your sources tell you something different from what you stated here as fact - you hold fast to your opinion. Convenient ignorance

You asserted the Chief and the officer were friends. What behaviors did the Chief and the officer exhibit that qualified them as friends?

I am waiting for you to produce some facts.

cfield,

Why don't you produce some proof that the were not friends. Again I will say call me a liar to my face. If you know so much and know so many people that have inside information then you will have no trouble finding me.

I am not going to clutter up this site with childish schoolyard talk.

I think people reading this blog will see you for what you are - you come on this site and others and make claims you get from your alleged sources, or your own head, and criticize police management, city management - what qualifies you to comment on any of these things. The pseudo police expert who has never even been a crossing guard.

Your have no expertise in this area, you simply carry other people's water.

And, it's funny how you stopped talking about proactive policing when called on it - what proof can you offer that it ended when the Chief took over. Do you even know what proactive policing is?

Come on marincic - this is your big moment, please share with us your vast knowledge of policing.

What gives me the right is i am a taxpayer in this city for 20 years. And proactive policing is a lie and that is because of Duane Johnson. You see a police officer can not sit on a drug house for an hour if it gets slow because their GPS will show that they are stationary and not at a call address and nobody wants to be accused of "sleeping on the job".

You must be licking the boots of some of those SPD brass that have caused all of the pain in the Dept. these last 20 years or maybe you are one of the democrat stooges responsible for destroying the city, whatever it is, you are part of the problem not the solution. Have a nice day.

One more thing, Proactive Policing is trying to stop a crime before it happens.

Welll thank you for that in depth commentary on proactive policing.

So a permanent unit designated to target crime hots spots would not be considered proactive policing?

After the DJ debacle, I think an officer can conduct surveillance - however, they would need to let someone know why they are stationary - again you seem to have a very limited grasp of what they can and cannot do - probably because of your sources of information.

To be quite frank, I am not licking anyone boots or beholden to anyone - I just got tired of reading your rants about things you have never done and your badmouthing of people you don't even know.

Actually I know much more than you want to pretend that I do. What hotspots would you be talking about, Hamilton Hill, Vale. I'm very aware of the crime mapping and the so called detail, the only problem is staffing and the fact that those same officers that are suppose to be "proactive policing" are the same officers that have to answer calls due to the high volumn and the lack of cops on the street.

Schenectady has the same per capita crime as Albany and Albany has 252 officers as opposed to Schenectady's 146 and a large ammount of the SPD officers are brass or detectives and not patrol officers.

Until you have a pro police Mayor and city council who want to get serious about crime and quality of life in Schenectady you will never have enough cops and all of the so called "proactive policing" in the world wont do a thing to stop it.

Won't quarrel with the notion that the PD could use more officers - but they can only field the number of officers the tax base can support.

RE: too many brass and detectives. Police brass - 6 Chief, 4ACs, and Commisioner - at a minimum - Department would need a Chief and an AC to run patrol and detectives - so even if they got rid of those positions - 3 positions, minus the civilian staff needed to perform the admin tasks would not generate a lot more officers, certainly not as many as needed.

RE: Detectives - they need more patrol officers and detectives

wmarincic, keep up the good work. Its evident you know what you are writing about. Just some further information, I believe Albany to have approx 330 officers to Schdy's current 135 or so. I would like to see anyone compare the call/crime/arrest statistics of the two cities and compare that to a per officer ratio. I'm confident it would shed some light on how understaffed the dept is and also how ridiculously top heavy it is.

They have 6 Command Staff - if you cut that in half you would gain those salaries but someone still has to do that work so you would not be able to devote it all to officer salaries.

ajames - evident to you maybe

cfield- Please list the job duties for each of the 4 assistant chiefs. Once you do that we can have a real conversation based on facts. Until then, it's evident you don't have a clue of what you're talking about.

Two of the assistant chiefs don't do a thing. Add up their two salaries including benefits and you are $350,000. Put that money towards hiring six more officers and put them in a proactive unit like the vice squad or directed patrol unit and you can make a real difference.

Please, don't try and tell me those two extra positions are needed or they have duties that will have to be placed elsewhere. I know much better than that but obviously havent got a clue.

When a certain Asst Chief was asked a couple years ago why he does not retire and he said "Chaires hates me so he gives me nothing to do, where else can you make over 100k to do nothing". Yes that job is needed, I have been saying from day one to get rid of the Asst. Chiefs and let the Lt's run the squads, that is a dozen more boots on ground making a difference. Cfield, do you think not one of those five chiefs did not know that their highest payed officer was sleeping on the job? Either way, they were not doing their job, Mike Seeber is probably the hardest working of all five of those guys. Make him the Chief and fire the rest.

List their job descriptions - just look at the website (SSB - accreditation, fleet management) (HR - 215 person worforce needs an HR maanger, patrol over 100 officers and investigations - approximately 35 officers) Those positions are needed and are present in other Departments. The Lieutenants have more than enough work to do without piling more on their plate.

Marincic - so your plan would be to fire the everyone except Seber and have him run patrol, investigations, human resources (hiring, training, payroll, all illness related issues, and wellness), in addition to what he does now policy development, (accreditation), fleet management). - That's an intersting idea (sarcasm off).

Officers break workplace rules - it happens - sleeping is one of those common behaviors when they do break the rules - sometimes they get away with it. FYI: He was fired almost 3 years ago.So, I wonder why you are still so fixated on him.

One final observation - ajames lauds marincics knowledge of policing. Additionally he endorses directed patrol. marincic labeled the Chief the bane of proactive policing - the Chief brought that concept of directed patrol to the Department. The logic does not seem consistent.

We have a commissioner for a reason, Bennett can do Seebers job and the Lt. who now run the squads can continue to run the squads.

@ cfield---(SSB - accreditation, fleet management)
An Assistant Chief needs to be in charge of fleet management.... oh my.... You could put a chimp on minimum wage in charge of fleet management and still be in no worse of a position. And accredidation--- you can't be serious. Do you honestly believe he has anything to do with accredidation? Please... So that's how you justify a $120,000 salary plus another $50,000+ in benefits? Pathetic.

The second A/C---HR--- You don't believe there's a better way to handle HR issues then put a $200,000 assistant chief in charge of it? You wouldn't make it very long in the business world, that's for sure.

@ajames--"the Chief brought that concept of directed patrol to the Department."

Directed patrol was first instituted in the City during the 1990's. Care to explain how he brought it to the City when he didn't become Chief until a decade later?

Back in the 90s the chief was then a lieutenant.

he imported the directed patrol strategy from Houston PDs community policing DART strategy

ajames you have no idea what youre talking about seber runs the accreditation program and they will be applying for formal evaluation later this year or early next year

it would have to be a fairly smart chimp to assess and order radar, incar video units as well as the computerizedvterminals in the car not to mention maintenance repairs, and procurement

PD requested authorization for a civilian HR director in 2003 or thereabouts. was not approved so yeah I think we are all in agreement it can be done cheaper

CFIELD,

Most PD's had radar and computers in the early 80's across the country. It is not that difficult to see what everyone else is using and order the equipment.

I see at least you don't dispute my direct quote from an Asst. Chief yet you are rallying for them to stay. I wonder why.

On the one hand, you said Seber is the hardest working Asst. Chief, yet next to accreditation fleet management is arguably one of his main duties, a task you say a chimp could perform. Again - inconsistent logic.

I could care less what some AC allegedly said to you - it's unverifiable, and I don't find you very credible.

Wow cfield I don't find you at all credible, just some blowhard suckup to the same people that ran the SPD into the ground. And I never said anything about "a chimp could do it". That was somebody else that you are arguing with.

yeah - ajames - the guy who said you knew what you are talking about.

better go cut Hamilton's lawn before it starts raining