HollisterFreelance.com | Red Phone: Will HPD's self-reporting policy vanish or continue?

Red Phone: Will HPD's self-reporting policy vanish or continue?

Aug 20, 2008

The caped crusader has kept a relatively low profile lately. Spurred by a viewing of "The Dark Knight," our hero has mitigated himself to more discrete street-level investigation work. Among the darkest alleys and stinkiest Dumpsters in town, our hero, your hero, everyone's hero, has found a new identity. He is Hollister's Red Knight - at least for today.

What the Red Knight has found, in turn, is that some citizens are particularly irked by street crimes going unsolved these days. But they're also upset on a certain level that the good people of Hollister, in many cases, are forced to do the detective work themselves if they expect to get their stolen goods back or their collision damage covered.

Prompting action by our hero was a red alert on the CherryBerry recently that relayed a message from an informant that said: "We had a car broken into at the 401 McCray St. parking lot on Aug. 8 at 6 a.m. So we called our local police and guess what they told us?'

At that point, our hero pondered her question before reading on. The Red Knight was so proud because the answer was oh so clear. The policeman obviously told her: "Ma'am, considering our staffing levels are still a bit low and our resources are better used on larger-scale crimes, I suggest you call the Red Phone, or else you might find the caped crusader by shining a light into the sky that's shaped like a giant, delicious lobster."

While stunned after reading on, our hero wasn't disappointed there was no mention of the knight or his lobster. The informant was griping about the Hollister Police Department's self-reporting policy on many lower-level offenses, so our hero called Officer Rosie Betanio to get the latest.

Betanio said the unpopular policy remains in effect and continues to call for self-reporting by citizens on a list of crimes, and she noted they can pick up the forms at fire stations, city hall and the HPD - or online at the city's Web site.

Police started the self-reporting policy after budget cuts a couple of years back decreased staffing levels. The list of crimes are what Police Chief Jeff Miller, phoned later by the Red Knight, referred to as being low-solvability offenses.

The chief made a point to say officers are frustrated just as citizens are, and he pointed out that police always respond to crimes in progress no matter what the scope.

The self-reporting list, the chief said, includes the following: hit-and-run accidents with no suspect information; traffic collisions on private properties without injuries; traffic collisions without injuries, except those involving government vehicles; theft or vandalism, excluding graffiti; auto burglaries with no suspect information; and annoying phone calls absent threats to personal safety.

"Ideally, in a perfect world, I'd love to have officers respond to every call immediately," the chief said.

Our hero's informant, however, continued in her e-mail critique to note how the Measure T sales-tax dollars were supposed to pump up the police department so more crimes could be solved.

The department, meanwhile, has merely begun to hire on more officers to bulk up the force again. It's at the full staffing level, in terms of numbers, from about a year ago, Miller said, while Betanio noted there are three openings right now.

While Chief Miller understands many citizens get upset at the self-reporting policy, he didn't say whether it'd be eliminated anytime soon because other staffing priorities might keep it alive.

He did emphasize that police expect to ramp up traffic enforcement in the coming months - another common area of citizen discontent - with the new officers coming on.

For a story on Chief Jeff Miller's plans to increase traffic enforcement and a separate story showing how traffic citations decreased sharply after recent budget cuts, see Friday's edition of the Free Lance.