On a night where dozens of citizens came forward to oppose the city’s acquisition by the police of the military MRAP vehicle, many of whom were speaking for the first time before council and gave impassioned speeches in opposition to the vehicle, it was the city council itself that was left to wrestle with how to approach the situation in a manner that reflected the values of the community but respected the dangerous work that the police have to do.
Ultimately, the council had to make the call. The council had its own passionate debate over how to proceed before narrowly, on a 3-1 vote with Brett Lee dissenting and Rochelle Swanson ultimately abstaining, adopting a motion made by Mayor Pro Tem Robb Davis and seconded by Mayor Dan Wolk.
Several dozen people came to the chambers – all but three expressed some form of opposition to the vehicle. (The Vanguard will have a follow up story that captures the public comment portion of the discussion).
Police Chief Landy Black said that the acquisition was justified and “not spurious on the department’s part. We have a genuine job-specific need for the types of equipment that most people wish that we wouldn’t have in our community because of the nature of the job that we have.”
He said there “is a very obvious tactical need for this vehicle.” We employ officers with a joint SWAT team with West Sacramento, something he called “an unfortunate but necessary commodity of our police department to deal with very volatile, risky, dangerous circumstances.”
In the last five years, the city has had 43 tactical deployments of our SWAT team to deal with high-risk search warrants, going to a home where people inside have criminal records and weapons. He cited a specific incident in east Davis where there was high power weaponry involved in a domestic situation where the perpetrator had three weapons that he fired.
Both Chief Black and Assistant Chief Darren Pytel showed examples of weapons found in the community and expressed concern about safety of the public and officers with these high powered weapons with ranges of half a mile that can penetrate both houses and personal protection.
Mayor Pro Tem Davis put forward a three-part motion. First, he said, “We instruct staff to return with options for disposing with the MRAP in the most expeditious and low cost manner within sixty days.” Second, “That we review donated or surplus material acquisition noticing guidelines to assure that major donated or surplus equipment … acquisitions by any department are reviewed by the city manager and city council.”
Third, “That we proceed with a very public update of the public safety issues related to active-shooter situations, warrants, and that we look at the solutions that do not represent repurposing of a military vehicle to face them and we hold public participatory forums to publicly share ideas on the options.”
In his comments to council prior to his motion, Mayor Pro Tem Davis indicated that he felt that council needed to weigh the probability of the need to use this vehicle in the community as well as the chances that it would be effective if the situation arose.
He further noted that we need to ask ourselves how far do we go to reduce our risks down to zero.
Mayor Pro Tem Davis said that “symbol matters,” and “we are a species that uses symbol” and “this symbolizes the most destructive force on the planet which is the US Military. I think we have to acknowledge that.”
He told the police chief, “I appreciate the trust that you’ve built in this community… this will hurt it.”
However, Brett Lee stated, “I do not support the motion because I think it makes the same mistake that got us to this situation which is we should discuss what the need is, and then pick what the most appropriate item is to address that need.” If we decide we do not need any equipment, we can choose not to acquire anything.
“In retrospect we probably should have been involved (in the decision), given the nature of the acquisition,” he said. “To just return it, without actually having had that discussion… if we return it, then we don’t have the ability to get it back. Two wrongs don’t make a right.”
“Three weeks from now if people feel the same way, we give it back,” he said, citing the process as being critical.
Robb Davis would respond, “I agree with everything that you’re saying except that I don’t think there’s going to be a scenario by which this vehicle will be acceptable to me or to this community.”
Councilmember Lee attempted a substitute motion to prevent the use of the vehicle unless the council authorizes its use. The council would then come back in four weeks to make a final disposition after studying the issue more.
He clarified, “We pretend as though we don’t have it and then we need to affirmatively say yes we want it or no, we don’t want it. We then follow the process that would have been best to have had from the beginning.”
Councilmember Lucas Frerichs said, “It’s hard to pretend that we don’t have it.” He would add that he supported the original motion on the floor.
Mayor Wolk explained his concerns with the vehicle, questioning the need as well as the perception in terms of the national trend of the militarization of the police force. He spoke of the pepper spray incident which he called “a black eye” for this community and “an overreaction by the police and law enforcement.”
“This council shouldn’t be in the role of dictating to the experts about what exactly we need to have,” he said, “but I think when it comes down to really big critical items like this one that really galvanize the community, I think there is a clear role for this city council in terms of its representation of the community.”
He added, “I do agree with Robb that I don’t see a scenario where I end up being okay with having this vehicle in our fleet.”
Brett Lee added a friendly amendment for a fourth point, which states, “The council would take the time over the next sixty days to meet with the police department to better understand the need for an armored vehicle at some type for the Davis Police Department.”
It was clear, however, that the line of separation between Brett Lee, and to a lesser extent Rochelle Swanson, and the other three was whether the council should leave open the possibility of reconsidering the vehicle in sixty days or make the decision immediately to return the vehicle.
Rochelle Swanson stated, “I think we need to right the wrong, and that means unfortunately having to do the process ourselves.” She didn’t want to make the same mistake of dismissing the equipment out of hand. “I feel like the motion just presupposes our decision,” she stated.
Robb Davis would again reiterate that he doesn’t see a scenario where this piece of equipment “will be acceptable to me and I won’t vote for it.” He agreed fully with going through that process, but did not believe it would change his mind.
Again, the council voted for this motion on a 3-1 vote, with Brett Lee in dissent and Rochelle Swanson abstaining.
—David M. Greenwald reporting
I didn’t have time to watch the meeting, did ANY of the speakers support keeping the MRAP (or ask that we try and get a “real” tank)?
There were at least 2 in support that I heard. May have been 3.
Three – Carlos Matos, Michelle Millet, and Jim Hechtl
My hat’s off to Michelle Millet for speaking her mind and not going along with the usual crowd.
Thanks. I’m probably going to be banned from all those cocktail parties hosted by the liberal elite in this community. Believe or not I generally base my views on issues on my own thoughts and feelings, not those of the “usual crowd”.
I was going to go, but I knew it was a hopeless cause. The emotional arguments were too strong. It like walking into an asylum and trying to convince the inmates to think rationally.
My guess is that the silent majority in this town supported it, or did not have a problem with it. But as usually it is those that get their feelings amped up the most are the ones that get the attention of this council.
Symbolism over common sense. Great. All that says is that we are incapable of doing the right thing when people are upset.
This thing is no more than a bomb shelter on wheels. The moral equivalency is to reject bomb shelters because they remind us of war.
By the way. Brett and Rochelle should be recognized as having the stuff of real leaders in this decision. They proved that they are capable and willing to make decisions for the good of the community in the face of opposition. I respect that even as I would disagree with a leaders’s decision from time to time.
I think Robb Davis also did a fair job rationalizing his decision. But his problem was that he spent most of his brain power calculating why we would not need this tool, and not enough on why we would need to get rid of it. He stacked the logic deck to one side out of the starting gate, so his final determination was inevitable.
brett would have prolonged the agony for six weeks – to what end?
i agree with you in the two people who were unimpressively pandering the entire time as they voted the way they thought the majority in the room wanted.
I think Brett and Rochelle were being respectful of the police chief and wanted to give him a chance to make his case more formally and more effectively. I doubt they or anyone else expected a different outcome from that process.
Frankly (because I am), I think that more time would have helped get people to calm down and view this in a pure cost/risk-benefit assessment instead of being so emotionally amped up.
I would better have supported a “get rid of it” vote after a more objective and rational cost/risk-benefit assessment.
Instead we say a decision that was made mostly in the heat of out of control passions. Decisions made in an emotional state are rarely optimized. Most decision mistakes made by humans are made precisely because they let their emotions overrule rational considerations.
Not problem having emotions and emotional responses… the key is to simmer down and think it through… understanding the root of the emotional response. Because we can also irrationally project strong feelings from one source or cause onto another subject.
For example, being pissed off about Ferguson and the problems in the Middle East causing a general negative perception about police and a strong recoil to symbols of war.
Ever throw a temper tantrum and get your way and then calm down and regret it?
“But as usually it is those that get their feelings amped up the most are the ones that get the attention of this council.” Maybe this so-called “silent majority” is just lame, and assumes that it was a hopeless cause, that the emotional arguments were too strong. Nothing like pre-supposing an outcome to cause it to occur.
Your logic is flawed. The council was 60% against the MRAP, while the public was 95% against the MRAP. All it would have taken is flipping one council member. Maybe you should have tried instead of not going and then complaining about Davis afterward in the Vanguard.
The only flip vote potential was Robb Davis and he got all of my arguments on the VG. There was no need to go waste my time with that group of emotionally amped up people.
The council needs to work on reaching out to their constituents without using the council meetings as their bellwether for public opinion. If they based all of their decisions on just who shows up at the council meetings to oppose something, they are going to miss the mark and erode the public trust in their capability to lead.
Frankly: I find it humorous that you see those opposed to this vehicle as being the ’emotional’ ones, implying that you are the one being ‘rational.’ All one needs to do is read your posts from the past couple of days to see who’s emotions were in play.
I don’t know if I heard him correctly, but the Chief brought up using this vehicle when serving warrants (though it wasn’t specifically spelled out that way in the staff report) and then commented (I believe) that the SWAT team was called out 40+ times last year to serve a warrant. If their intent was to use this vehicle every time the SWAT team was called out in this manner, then we aren’t looking at a ‘rare’ event as was presented, but a fairly common one at 3-4 times per month.
I commented before on my concern about ‘mission creep’ and it seems that concern was justified. The CC made a rational decision last night in the face of emotional arguments on both sides.
Not all that were opposed are the emotional ones. But did you watch the council meeting?
This “militarization” point is an example of a level of hype. Is the issues symbolism or are there measurable and definitive problems we can point to?
The way I see it is that people generally recoil from images of war and violent crime and war, but they irrationally project that onto soldiers and police as being the cause. It is idiotic in my view to make the case that just because the cops look a certain way, or use certain tools, that this causes the type of behavior that leads to justification for the look and tools. Bad guys exist. We cannot wish them away with flower-power.
Do you really think putting cops in tie-die t-shirts and jeans and a clipboard is going to lead to more effective law enforcement? If not that far, then where do you draw the line? Maybe you are more on the side of US police being like British Bobbies. I don’t see that working very well, but maybe we should open a dialog about it.
By the way… Britain has a lot of these blast-proof vehicles in service.
I’d find it informative and illustrative to know what these search warrants are for, and who we are serving warrants to.
Is this a warrant to a slacker Dad who hasn’t paid his child support, or to a gang banger who has missed his meeting with his PO?
The public was not 95% against the truck. Maybe your circle of friends was 95% against it, but I doubt your circle of friends represents the community. At least I know that they don’t represent my circle of friends in this town.
I’ve been saying this for awhile. We have a group of dedicated activists who have the council’s ear. They’re many of the same people you see on the city commissions. So I feel we have a small minority pushing through their agendas over the silent majority. You have to hand it to them, they show up and are dedicated and for the most part the council won’t step on their toes.
I don’t have problem with dedicated activist. I have a problem when council bases decisions that effect the community at large on the opinions of these activist. Council should be representing the best interest of everyone in this community, not just the ones who email them and show up at meetings to express their opinions.
Oi vey! Would you two stay-at-home anonymoids quit already! You say you didn’t go to the meeting, and then you complain in this little forum when you don’t get your way. Pu-leeeeeease!
I would have been great to have you at the meeting. Maybe you should get on a city commission. Or have all your friends who you say are the “silent majority” actually vote. You do know if they are actually the majority that if they voted then their candidates would be on the council, right?
michelle: do you really believe that this was going to fly? don’t you think if the council had left this a citizen group would have put it on the ballot and it would have been voted out of town? is that really what we needed to focus on at this moment?
Alan, I did email the council members, I almost always do. I think most people that feel differently than the 50 or so activists that posse up and always show for these types of causes feel why go to the meetings just to be outnumbered and looked down on by the liberal crowd. Unfortunately the council seems to not want to get on their bad side. Once again, kudos to Brett Lee for standing up to them and not pandering.
I’m not suggesting we put it on the ballot. I’m suggesting that we don’t make a knee jerk reaction to owning it by voting to send it back before we have fully understood the cost and benefits of keeping it.
I’m not as much disappointed in the outcome of last nights vote as I am in the process by which this decision was made.
“My guess is that the silent majority in this town supported it, or did not have a problem with it”
you’re making the same mistake that the chief made in believing that this is a small minority of the population. the chief has a deaf ear on this. how he thought that the citizenry would be accepting of this is beyond me.
So what is the harm in keeping the vehicle until a better assessment of our need for it and the communities feelings about it can be conducted?
Good, now we won’t have to worry about another Tiananmen Square incident.
DG, good job summarizing the discussion from a very long session.
Yes, it was about ~50-3 against in the public and 3-2 against (the MRAP) on the Council.
Did anyone catch what went down with Rochelle’s vote? I clearly saw her vote “yeah” when the vote was taken, and even saw Dan Wolk ask her what her vote was, I would guess because he was surprised by it. The vote was announced. Then, after the break, it was announced she abstained. Are Council members “allowed” to change their vote? I’ve never seen it before. Perhaps I misinterpreted what I saw; that’s how it appeared to me
I thought she voted yes as well. I was surprised to see the vote reported as 3-1-1.
I’ll have to look at the video, but if she did indeed vote “yes” to make it 3-2 and it was later reported as 3-1-1 then that is just wrong. Brett Lee scored some points too for sticking to his guns.
I wonder if the video will be focused in the right place. And I also wonder if technically this is “OK”. I also wonder what the motive/message was in seeking to “abstain” on such an important vote.
To be clear, I believed the original vote to be 4-1, with Rochelle voting in favor of returning the vehicle.
So did everyone who left the room after the break was called and didn’t stay for the next item. Which was damn near everyone.
If Rochelle’s vote was recorded inaccurately why wasn’t the mistake corrected immediately?
No votes were changed after the fact. City council voting process is very specific and requires accuracy. Council member Swanson did not vote yes and registered the inaccuracy with the parliamentarian (mayor) as soon as it happened. A break was called for them to converse so that she should correct the statement of the voting outcome.
Additionally, the city attorney and city clerk would not allow for a changed vote post casting. Therefore, there must have been some reason for doubt about the original outcome. This is one of many reasons that video of the meeting exists as does the parliamentarian calling out the vote results. We work to get all of the checks and balances in place, but human processes can be fallible, which is why you will sometimes see the parliamentarian call out a specific vote for each council member. In this case, the error was noted quickly and rectified.
And as David noted in his article above, Council member Swanson’s statements reflect her abstention… “It was clear, however, that the line of separation between Brett Lee, and to a lesser extent Rochelle Swanson, and the other three was whether the council should leave open the possibility of reconsidering the vehicle in sixty days or make the decision immediately to return the vehicle. Rochelle Swanson stated, ‘I think we need to right the wrong, and that means unfortunately having to do the process ourselves.’ She didn’t want to make the same mistake of dismissing the equipment out of hand. ‘I feel like the motion just presupposes our decision,’ she stated.”
By David’s own reporting, a changed vote after the fact would be illogical and not meet the test of rationality. Again, the City takes protocol every serious, and the clerk, city attorney, city manager and parliamentarian all work together to ensure accuracy. And when an error is made, it is corrected quickly and on the record.
Thanks Rob for addressing this.
Since for unexplained reasons the City Business Park Officer decided to write a verbose piece to defend a city council-member, I went to the video to look for myself. As objectively as possible here’s what I see at (3:34):
Dan calls for the vote,
Asks for in favors,
Rochelle’s lips move,
Dan asks for neighs,
Rochelle’s lips do not move
He turns to Rochelle and says, “Did you vote in favor?”
Rochelle laughs briefly and looks down.
The council briefly talks about a few other things with Dan leading,
Rochelle comments briefly on that discussion,
Rochelle does not approach Dan.
Rochelle leaves the room out the secret back door.
I am curious if others see it differently. I found this odd the moment I saw the vote in person, and the video — yes it’s a little hard to tell with the low quality vid — confirms what I thought I saw in person.
I would like to correct the statement, “A break was called for them to converse”, as the break was happening regardless, it was not called FOR that reason.
As objectively as possible
Maybe it isn’t possible.
I’m really confused. I just watch the tape. Dan said the motion passed 4-1. No one corrected him.
According to Robert’s Rules Online (rulesonline.com):
I don’t know if CA law recognizes Robert’s Rules in this regard, but it sure looked to me as though Rochelle voted one way — perhaps inadvertently — and then changed it. No harm, no foul, but unfortunately the video doesn’t show the exchange that occurred during the break.
It’d be interesting to learn exactly what process was followed to correct/change her vote, though.
Have to look at Rosenberg’s Rules of Order since that’s what the city uses, but it may well be similar.
Funny, I thought Lucas, Dan and Robb scored some points. Could it be who scored points is based on our perspective on an issue? NO!!!!!!! I especially appreciate that Lucas, Dan and Robb saved me a lot of money in that I can now cancel the first run of “Tank the TANK” lawns signs.
I didn’t get a good sense from Lucas or Dan on why the opposed keeping the vehicle. The concerns they expressed were addressed by the Landy Black (i.e. no additional police time or expense would be necessary).
agreed. they looked like they were trying to pander to everyone.
I don’t have particularly strong feelings about keeping or not keeping this vehicle. I see it as rescue vehicle that was given to us for free.
I have a bigger problem with how the decision not to keep it was made, which seems to based on the fact that a vocal group of people don’t like it. My guess is that most people don’t have strong feelings about it either way, and are fine with the police acquiring it. Unfortunately we don’t generally hear from these people. It’s not accurate to gage general public opinion based on the number of people who show up at council meetings, or email their council members. IMO council should not be basing decisions on issues like this one on these biased public opinion samples. (To be fair to Robb I believe he based his decision on his own values, which were independent of public opinion.)
Another voice of reasons. 100% agree.
Although I am a bit more irritated because of the dismissal of the benefit of keeping our safety personnel safe. Tis the season to hate cops, right?
I don’t believe Davis residents hate cops. I don’t think those who spoke against the MRAP hate cops. I don’t believe the Davis council majority hates cops. So I think you’ve made a hyperbolic leap.
There are certainly hyperbolic leaps in opinion going on with respect to law enforcement these days, but they are not mine.
By the way… just read the headline of this VG article for evidence of the negative branding of police. Evidence of hate comes in subtleties right? I am reminded of that over and over again.
I did find it sad that so many people seemed willing to sacrifice officer safety for the sole reason that owning this vehicle made them personally uncomfortable. I’m not saying this was true for all public commenters, but it was a pretty big theme.
I agree, but more to the point… it is the CC I am more disappointed in because they have a greater responsibility to factor that consideration.
Cop haters are cop haters. Does our CC kowtow to them, or should the CC politely politely listen and then give preference to the safety as a first consideration? I see more kowtowing than I do consideration for the safety of our officers.
I agree. I wish officer safety had weighed more heavily in their decision and had been a greater part of councils conversation which instead, with few exceptions, seemed to focus on the fact the citizens didn’t like they way the vehicle made them feel.
Yes, and Because I lack feelings, I don’t get it.
Doubling down on this now? So who hates cops in Davis? Please be specific. Otherwise: yes, it’s hyperbole, it’s intentionally provocative, and it is unnecessary. Can you have a discussion without typecasting those with whom you disagree?
I called the cops two hours before I spoke at the meeting, as I testified, because there was a man in the bushes 30′ from my front door. As with 95% of the times of have an interaction with the Davis Police, I received excellent service. I really like the field police in this town in general, and have seen them use conflict de-escalation techniques on a couple of occasions and have been impressed in the few incidents I have seen. Also, Davis police were in the riot-gear line on 11-8-2011, and reportedly as a group expressed concern over the approach being employed by the UCD police. I’ve helped the police on several occasions catch criminals in the act and once went to testify against a person I helped apprehend. I like and support the Davis police. I think this acquisition is wrong for Davis. Two different things. If you listened to the testimony, the majority of the public and the council went out of their way to say how much they appreciated the Davis Police dept. That’s not the same as going along with every decision they make. And no, they weren’t “just saying that”. In my experience “police haters” can’t help themselves to make the point of how much they hate the police. I saw nothing but sincere appreciation of our Police Department, along with criticism for this one decision and how it was carried out. So in conclusion, the “police haters” label that you attempted to throw on everyone is flat wrong. Not even a nice try.
I’m a cop, and the season for hating them was the 60’s. The respect (occasionally begrudging) shown towards the DPD leadership and membership was pervasive throughout the session. Cop-hating still exists, but in bite-size portions compared to 50 years ago.
While I didn’t sense a lot of hate towards to the police, I did get a sense of distrust from many of the public commenters. I wish officer safety had played a bigger part of the decision, or at least the conversation, of whether or not to keep the vehicle.
Phil I thought one of the more remarkable aspects of last night’s meeting is that while there was passion, frustration, occasionally anger, and yet it was rarely directed at the local police and certainly to no one directly.
Yes, let’s have the council no longer take public comment, or public emails, and instead have the council vote on what a small group of people on this site THINK is the opinion of a an actual majority of people who don’t care enough to email or come to a council meeting — or even read the paper — and vote instead on what this small, vocal-on-the-Vanguard thinks this bunch of silent people are thinking. Yet, great system.
Oi vey! This is just sour grapes. After things don’t go as I would like on the council, such as the water rates for example, I don’t start making up silent groups of possibly-existent groups of people who actually think a certain way and actually would have changed the council’s vote, if only the council would listen to them in their massive silence!
First, I don’t care that much about what happens with the armored vehicle. I felt compelled to give public comment last night only to add a different perspective to the conversation.
I believe public comment is important, so is the ability to communicate with your council members via email.
What I don’t believe is that council should base their decisions on this as if it is a straw poll. They represent EVERYONE in this community including those who don’t vote or even realize we have a city council. The needs and desires of people that show up at council meeting should not be given any more weight then those who have no idea where council chambers are located.
How would the Council determine what those people think? I don’t disagree that those that COME to meetings may not represent the community vote proportions, and I understand that only a small majority of people are inclined to go to City Council meetings, largely due to time limitations and priorities. However, taking the time to send an email on issues one cares about is not so burdensome. Some little birdies flew into my brain and lodged there and indicated that emails were similar in proportion to what was seen at the meeting. So those that don’t care enough to participate at all or gave up and stayed home because they couldn’t compete with the “emotional people” #whaaa! whaaa!# — how — or why — should these people be counted? How does the Council accurately assume what they think?
You are missing my point. Council should not IMO base decisions on how many emails they get on an issue. What if I got a bunch of people in South Davis to email council telling them we want a pool on our side of town, and we all showed up council meetings demanding one. Should council divert funds for a new pool because I can get enough people to ask for one? No. It’s council job to weigh the pro’s and con’s of any decision based on what is best for our community over all. Not just the “loudest” people.
IMO-Brett’s proposal that we take more time to evaluate the need for an armored vehicle and the appropriateness of possessing this particular one best served the community as a whole. Not just the people in the room last night or the ones that sent emails.
“It’s council job to weigh the pro’s and con’s of any decision based on what is best for our community over all. Not just the “loudest” people.”
The best statement of the day.
Lots of suppositions, Michelle. One, you are supposing that the people who showed up at the council meeting were not any indication of what the “true,” overall opinion might be — and two, you are supposing that the council did not do as you say (carefully weigh the pros and cons).
If we are going to base a decision on public sentiment then we should have a better sense of how the community overall feels on this issue. I don’t think we should base this determination on the number of people who show up at council meeting. Maybe in this case it happens to be ab accurate assessment, but maybe it’s not. I don’t think it is a reliable predictor.
Given the caliber of the questions asked last night it is apparent that council member knew very little about this vehicle, the training required to operate it, and the cost associated with maintaining it. Brett stated he hadn’t seen it yet, Lucas even asked if it was too heavy for our roads.
Brett’s suggestions was to give the community and council a little more time to think about the pro’s and con’s. They voted against doing that.
If a 50 meter pool was on the council agenda I have no doubt that the swimming community could rally hundreds of people to show to the meeting. Does that represent the whole community, I say no. I doubt most people against paying a tax for a new pool would bother showing up because the people for the pool are more energized than the people who are against it. That doesn’t mean that the community is more for a pool. The number or the loudness of the people that show up to a council meeting should have little bearing in the council’s decisions, but unfortunately our council let’s the local activists intimidate them.
Maybe our police officers should stop wearing bullet proof vests, as it sends the wrong message and contributes to the “militarization” of the police. Ban police dogs, too, which remind me of the Third Reich.
An interesting side note, the pictures displayed didn’t show a very “diverse” crowd, it seems to show a lot of quasi, upper middle class hippies.
You know, I just had a thought that aircraft are used in warfare so we should reject all aircraft.
Helicopters bring up those terrible visions of Viet Nam… let’s get rid of those too.
Also rockets. Down with rockets!
And let’s also outlaw bomb shelters because those too remind us of war.
Or maybe we just make sure these things never get to Davis… they are fine everywhere else.
There are rockets in Davis?
Estes rockets.
“An interesting side note, the pictures displayed didn’t show a very “diverse” crowd, it seems to show a lot of quasi, upper middle class hippies.”
We encourage everyone to participate in the political process, unless it is on a topic on which those that will show up disagree with our beliefs, in which case we will complain on a blog by attaching labels to “them” in an effort to discredit, #ahem# . . . “them”.
i’d like to ask this – we have a situation as described last night, husband and wife fighting and it escalates, how does the vehicle help resolve the situation in the house?
I think the tank would just blast the house with its cannon and then crush it, thereby eliminating the threat.
Or maybe in the case where the wife had a history of abusing her husband and had a gun trained on him and had already shot out the window at the patrol cars that were attempting to get close enough to talk her down.
“I think the tank would just blast the house with its cannon and then crush it, thereby eliminating the threat.”
Now that example may have turned one or more council members to your side!
To Michelle Millet as the only rational voice on the “Thanks for the Tank” side of the debate, I would suggest that the City of Davis rejection of this vehicle does not close the door on ensuring officer safety. A very important part of the council decision is to have more information on the use of current equipment and, most importantly, a public discussion. That will take a lot longer than 60 days. This is a process that is long overdue and the demise of the MRAP is what happens when policy is made administratively instead of politically. This is a plain case of the cart before the horse.
It’s possible the community of Davis will end up with some kind of armored vehicle after the discussion is completed. It is also possible that 43 SWAT team deployments in the last five years was 40 too many. Hopefully, we will get to peer behind the curtain and gain confidence in what we are being told. The public, in general, has little trust in putting so much firepower into the hands of police bureaucracies. And that is not a liberal versus conservative assessment.
Dave a completely agree. The sticking point for me is that this vehicle was free. Why not just keep it decommissioned while we go through the process you outlined above, instead of returning it only to then decide we need a vehicle with its capabilities.
“The public, in general, has little trust in putting so much firepower into the hands of police bureaucracies.”
Please enlighten us as to what firepower the donated MWRAP was fitted with?