Quotas for Police

* Re “Union Alleged L.A. Police Quota for Tickets,” Feb. 27.

Minimum standards of performance are a commonplace thing in our work environment today. The stats generated assist supervisors in focusing on what may appear as less productive personnel, giving them assistance, guidance and training in areas of question.

Those of us who drive streets and freeways have no question as to the need for enforcement of traffic regulations. A ticket per watch per officer during an eight-hour shift does not seem unreasonable; call load should naturally be considered.

Quotas are not new to the department. We had them in 1946 when I became an officer in the Los Angeles Police Department. The officers’ performance was recorded on a daily basis taking note of arrests, citations, field interviews, crime reports, radio calls and the time spent on each activity. This data was posted monthly on the officers’ bulletin board. This was never a problem for those of us who enjoyed what we were doing to protect and to serve.

Traffic slows when a police vehicle is noted. Why? Because no one wants a citation. Citations are effective in making our streets safer. They are but a tool to change drivers’ pattern of conduct.

Crime stats are also plotted by type of crime, time of day and day of the week, allowing enforcement to be increased in those areas of most concern. Police station boundaries may be changed based on the frequency of crime, and officers are generally deployed to stations based on each station’s percentage of the total department’s crime data. Officers are deployed on the various watches depending on the crime data by hour of the day at each station.

My point is that the so-called quota system does have a reasonable, rational, necessary purpose, and it does have an impact on the crime and accident rates in our city.

RICHARD GREEN

LAPD Retired

Thousand Oaks