Law Enforcement

Earlier this week, Vanguard went to San Francisco to attend the public defender’s “Justice Summit,” an event that the Vanguard attended last year as well.  This year’s summit had three panels, including one of police misconduct.

To his credit, new San Francisco Police Chief Greg Suhr participated as a member of the panel, along with some defense attorneys, a representative from the DA’s office, a representative from the Public Defender’s office and renowned civil rights attorney John Burris.

The city council on Tuesday will hear a largely informational report on the 2011 Picnic Day, which followed a 2010 Picnic Day that saw “uncontrollable crowds and riotous behavior in downtown Davis.”

Efforts were made by leaders in the community and on campus to “make Picnic Day 2011 a different event, focusing on family and community-friendly efforts and ‘rewinding’ Picnic Day to its original purpose as the university’s primary open house.”

This morning the Sacramento Bee writes, “To preserve what’s best about Picnic Day and to secure its long-term future, Davis leaders need to give it a break.”

They continue, “The timeout – a year or two – would give campus and city officials in Davis the freedom to find ways to control the drunkenness marring the annual open house at University of California, Davis, without ruining its family-friendly atmosphere and school spirit.”

I spent almost eight hours out on the streets on Saturday night watching Picnic Day.  There were few major problems.  And really by mid-evening, the crowds had died down and it was closer to a normal Saturday, maybe even a slow Saturday, than it was to any type of special event, except for the presence of large numbers of police.

Nevertheless, the word creeping out is of the problems of Picnic Day.  Some people are talking about canceling the event (which is something the city cannot do anyway).  Some are talking about cutting off booze in the downtown.

The statistics emerging from the Davis Police Department are starting to mirror our on-the-ground perceptions of Picnic Day.  While the DPD is not offering opinions on whether this year’s Picnic Day was better or worse than last year, they indeed plan to “conduct further analysis of our [their] activity and seek input from community members and other stakeholders before offering any conclusions,” and they do report that there were fewer crimes of violence this year than last year.

“At this time the Davis Police Department is not prepared to issue any opinions about whether this year’s Picnic Day was better or worse than last year,” the department spokesperson Lt. Paul Doroshov said in a press release on Monday.

In the coming days and weeks, public officials will be assessing the success or failure of Picnic Day.  The common thought, at least at this point, is that problems and incidents were down, but the tragedy of Scott Heinig stings.

According to police sources, overall, arrests were down.  The number of fights, while present, were down.

Yesterday the Davis Downtown Business Association announced that 32 business with licenses to sell alcohol have signed a 13-point Picnic Day Community Covenant, agreeing to responsible hospitality practices that highlight moderation and appropriate use of alcoholic beverages on Picnic Day 2011, scheduled for Saturday, April 16.

According to their release, 25 of those 32 businesses are based in the Davis Downtown area, which was the site of the majority of Picnic Day-related disturbances in 2010.

Last week, the City of Davis, looking to take more measures to prevent a repeat of what happened at Picnic Day last year, gave police officers the authority to double fines for violations within a specific safety zone.

Fines for violations of open containers of alcohol in public and excessive noise will rise from $160 to $320.

The Sacramento Bee this morning reports on a closed-door meeting held on Monday with the Davis police, business representatives, students leaders and city staff members.  According to Gary Sandy, the university’s director of local government relations, the group has decided to form a task force to fix Picnic Day.

Mr. Sandy told the Bee, “If Picnic Day is to survive, it will have to change radically.”  He continued, “The message will be sent, loud and clear, that Picnic Day is not party day.  This ought to be a celebration of UC Davis and the Davis community, not a day for drunkenness and rowdiness.”

The Vanguard has learned through numerous sources that Davis Police Chief, Landy Black, since 2007, is a finalist for the Chief position at the Fairfield Police Department.

Chief Black acknowledged that in part this was due to financial considerations, but also the opportunity for professional advancement.  The city is in the process of considering whether to increase the Chief’s compensation in order to insure a continuation of his services.

In light of picnic day events and public scrutiny, it appears that the Davis Graduate has reviewed its policy on serving beer at 6 am and has now changed its policies.  The Graduate became a focus in part because of erroneous police reports that suggested the Graduate the locus for a fight that injured a police officer, but also because many people believed that selling alcohol at 6 am set a bad example and began drinking at an earlier hour than they otherwise might have.

From the Vanguard’s perspective, this became a story primarily because Rochelle Swanson, the wife of owner Charlie Swanson, is running for Davis City Council.  She had originally stated that the decision to serve alcohol at 6 am was not a decision she alone could make.

Yesterday the Vanguard covered Davis City Council Candidate, Rochelle Swanson’s response to community concerns about the events of Picnic Day and decision by many bars to serve alcohol at 6 am.  The Graduate became a focus in part because of erroneous police reports that suggested the Graduate the locus for a fight that injured a police officer.

From our standpoint, this was an issue precisely because Ms. Swanson, whose husband owns the Graduate, is a City Council candidate.  The Vanguard received a good amount of interest in the issue on Wednesday leading up to our Meet the Candidates Event.  For that reason, we decided that we ought to allow Rochelle Swanson address the issue herself.  The Vanguard interviewed Ms. Swanson for six minutes and she followed that up with two posts.

Complaints arose this weekend after Picnic Day saw a rash of street brawls, assaulted women, drunken students, and general destruction.  According to a report in the Sacramento Bee there were 516 calls for service and 33 arrests this past weekend, a number that is more than twice that of previous years.

The Vanguard unusually received a high volume of emails and phone calls from various community members concerned not only with what occurred last weekend, but also that numerous bars opened at 6 a.m. and began serving alcohol.  As one person said via a phone conversation, all this does is contribute to an atmosphere where young people are walking around drunk and intoxicated from the early morning hours on.  What do they expect to occur when alcohol consumption is encouraged at such an early time?

Last week a California circuit issued a ruling on the use of Tasers.  The court limited the use of Tasers to situations where a suspect poses an actual threat.  The court ruled that simply disobeying orders or acting strangely is not enough.  Those officers who fail to adhere to these rules can be sued for excessive force.

On Wednesday, the Sacramento Bee had an interview with Sacramento County Sheriff John McGinness about their department’s policies on the use of Tasers.  The Vanguard has asked similar questions of Davis Police Chief Landy Black.  Chief Black also directed us to the Davis Police Department’s policies on the use of Tasers and the use of deadly force.

Our initial report on Saturday did not have access to the staff report because the city’s computer system was down at the time it was written.  The staff report is now available and raises far more questions than answers primarily because it gives no rationale for the exemption other than the fact that the Council voted to direct staff to examine the noise ordinance and suggest approaches to dealing with child care centers and schools.

The issue of the time limitations for the noise ordinance exemption are interesting:

Back in March, Mayor Pro Tem Don Saylor requested an item by a Councilmember on the agenda that would exempt from the City’s Noise Ordinance, Schools and Day Care centers.  Mayor Pro Tem Saylor described the noise as the natural and delightful noise of children.  He openly wondered who could object to the sounds of children, implying that those who did were simply being selfish and insensitive.

The Vanguard immediately identified the source of this request, as for years, the residents of Cezanne Court have been fighting John Hillis, owner of the private for profit Montessori Country Day Care Center.  As one of the neighbors described it to me, the problem is so bad that once school begins at 8:30 am, there is no possibility of resting in their own home.  There is persistent noise throughout the day at levels approaching 90 dbs.  Moreover there is trash and litter thrown throughout various adjacent properties.

In light of four high profile shootings in a two month period there were concerns growing in the community that these shootings were a reflection of a rise in crime that threatened the city of Davis.  Accordingly, the Vanguard acquired the last two years of uniform crime statistics, the same statistics that the city sends on a monthly basis to the Justice Department.

A cursory examination of these statistics however, show little evidence of an increase in the crime rate in Davis over the last two years.  And if anything the categories of burglary and larceny have trended down over that period, assault has remained stable if not a slightly downward trajectory, and motor theft has fluctuated but has at most remained stable if not also a slightly downward trajectory.

Early this past week, Davis Police Officers responded to a request to provide emergency back up for a Yolo County Sheriff’s Deputy responding to a situation on Hanover Drive.  A Sheriff’s deputy was at an apartment complex on Hanover Drive enforcing an eviction order on a resident in the complex.

According to reports from Davis Police, the deputy made contact with the resident at the front door of the apartment.  The deputy was confronted by the resident who was wielding a knife and the deputy shot the resident.

Back in March, an item was placed on the Davis City Council agenda that would exempt from the City’s Noise Ordinance, Schools and Day Care centers.  That effort never came to fruition as the Vanguard ran not one but two articles chronicling the 15 year struggle that the neighbors had with the facility trying to control the noise problems to have a decent quality of life.

While the exemption from the city never occurred, the noise problem remains and has actually worsened.  A letter signed by at least five residents was recently sent to City Manager Bill Emlen and copied to the the Police Chief Landy Black, each of the councilmembers, the Davis Enterprise and the Vanguard.