County Board's second budget work session was with Arlington's public service agencies yesterday - Police Department, Fire Department, Sheriffs Office, and Emergency Communications Center. Bottom line on their operations is that all are strained because of Arlington's population growth (variously estimated at between 14,000 and 21,000 since the 2010 Census), increased Creative Class partying, and a Criminal Justice System that is becoming more punitive.
The FY 15 Budget will add only a few new full-time employees to the Arlington Police Department, Fire Department, Sheriff's Office, and Emergency Communications Center. All three agencies have resorted to overtime and flexible resource allocation to meet demands for service and maintain federal and state accreditation. The Sheriff's Office is experiencing an acute shortage of staff and is resorting to inmate lockdowns to reduce staff overtime. Emergency Communications Center has gone to 8 and 10 hour shifts and flexible scheduling to meet residents' calls for service. Creative Class evening and weekend partying in the Ballston-Rosslyn corridor has cut into the Police Department's budget for other services. The Fire Department is planning to offer enhanced medical services at incident and accident sites rather than transport persons with minor injuries to a hospital.
There was no interest by the County Board, ECC, Police Department, Sheriff's Office, or Fire Department in exploring ways to reduce their work load by decriminalizing behavior like marijuana use. Nor was there any discussion about effects of future population growth on public service agencies. The County Board (especially Chairman Fisette) was generally unsympathetic to requests for more full-time employees by Arlington's public service agency managers.
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26 comments:
Question - who gets the millions the County annually receives from meals tax revenue in the B-R corridor?
Wild guess --- the Artisphere?
More likely the architect-planner-consultant designed playgrounds at $525,000 per playground.
The Taj Mahal dog parks?
If they want to lock lots more people up why do they complain they don't have the resources to guard the inmates?
Virginia is legally retarded - everything from antiquated absentee voting regulations to increased prosecution for marijuana possession.
Why is County Government promoting more bars and restaurants in the B-R corridor, more pub crawling, and more festivals if those activities are causing significant social problems?
Ask 'Whitlows Mary' Hynes.
Yupette, I never fell off a bar stool in A-Town nor off a seat on the Trolley Pub while totally s--- faced.
Can I still be a volunteer in Patrick Hope's congressional campaign?
Yes. Hope for Congress Campaign will give credit for attending beer pong events at Dr. Dremo.
Fire Department wants to hire a nurse practitioner to respond to medical emergencies in the B-R Corridor and elsewhere when one drunken creative class yupster decks another creative class yupster rather than have an EMS unit respond.
Hope for Congress Campaign will also give credit for attending events and becoming s-faced and obnoxious at Velocity 5 and World of Beer.
So, why aren't these County Board 2014 budget work session meetings being broadcast over arlingtonva.us like any other County Board meetings?
Hey, the GOOD NEWS is Arlington Police Department has a federal grant for three new elementary school School Resource Officers. So, if your K-6 child likes to read books rather than play soccer you and your child may be in Juvenile and Domestic Relations Court, sooner than you think.
Police Department will have a brand new firearms range at Dulles and Fire Department will have a brand new training academy in the Trades Center.
ECC is ordering brand new 2-way radios, which you will not be able to hear on your Radio Shack scanner.
Why do they bother? Soon there will be no more Radio Shack.
Arlington Police Department will soon have a new paperless records system to complement the new elementary school resource officers.
Patrick Hope? Jim Moran circa 1984, without the temper.
So, what can you expect? No more college students acting up and acting out in college, colleges won't allow that. All the partng and getting D & D now occur after they graduate, can legally drink, and are finally away from Mom and Dad after 21 or 22 years.
So the cops are too busy patrolling the Yupster party zones to do community policing anywhere else in the County?
Community policing? Arlington police officers can't drive thru my neighborhood fast enough.
John Vihstadt for County Board !!!
Well, yeah, if you set up sobriety checkpoints outside the yupster party zones and give yupsters jail time for DWI you are going to have more inmates.
Of course you can always pub crawl via bicycle.
Pub crawl via bicycle? Increasingly popular mode of transportation by persons whose drivers licenses are revoked or suspended for DWI.
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