Annapolis Capital Punishment

CP is pleased to provide the below letter from Eastport Alderman Ross Arnett. Ross is trying hard to communicate with Eastporters who were used to regular communications from former Alderman Josh Cohen. When it was becoming apparent that he was not doing such a good job in this area, CP helped get the word out that Ross needed to step up his efforts--and he has. I wonder if his colleagues are doing similar things in their wards. Alderman Shropshire used to do a good job in this regard, but he has either abandoned those efforts or just removed CP from the mailing list. ??? And now, from Ross:

As you are aware from police reports and coverage in the Capital, 2007 was not a good year for crime in the City. We had two notorious muggings this summer in Eastport and rises in burglary, larceny, and motor vehicle theft crime. The City had a record high of nine murders.

Next month I will have been in office for a year. When I ran in last year’s special election, I made crime one of my three priority areas. I promised to seek assignment to the City Council’s Public Safety Committee (PSC) and I called for four steps to reduce crime:

Ø Fill the 20 vacancies on the police force,

Ø Increase police patrols on foot and bicycle
Ø Improve lighting on streets and alleys, and

Ø Focus police resources on high crime areas through surveillance, stings, and arrests.



Progress is mixed in these areas, but there is progress. I did get appointed to the Public Safety Committee and we have been busy working on ways to reduce crime, as described later. Vacancies on the force have fluctuated, but we are still down about 20 positions. The Chief has promised to increase foot patrols and to use more bicycle patrols when he gets the force up to strength. He makes the same promise with regard to more resources in high crime areas. Finally, through the efforts of the Eastport Civic Association’s Crime Taskforce, we have identified streets and alleys where more lighting is needed. The City has that list and is working on the lighting.

Obviously, as crime is on the increase, we have more work to do.

The number one focus for the PSC has been to enable the Chief to hire more officers and to retain the officers we have. We have made two recommendations to this end:


Ø Increase officer salaries and

Ø Develop an affordable housing program for officers


These recommendations will now go to the Finance Committee for consideration in this year’s deliberations for the FY 2009 budget, deliberations that have already begun.

As you may have read in the paper, the Mayor, who is the executive authority for the City, has her own set of initiatives to address crime. Many of these are similar to the PSC recommendations; some go in other directions. [An excellent recap of the current status of the Mayor’s initiatives is in the latest ECA Newsletter.]


It should be noted that Council has no administrative authority; we can make policy, write laws, and control the purse strings. By the Charter, we are not allowed to direct the activities of any department or its staff. Our power comes primarily from the budget. I raise this point because many of you have asked why we don’t, “just make the Chief hire more officers.” What we can do is provide the budget and incentives for those hires.


The PSC has offered additional recommendations for reducing crime that are highlighted below. [If you have not seen the PSC Report and Recommendations, I am happy to send you an electronic copy by email.]

Ø Use proven community oriented policing programs:

o Exploring programs used successfully in other cities,

o Foot patrols for targeted high crime areas, and

o Form an auxiliary police force to supplement the sworn officers


Ø Partner with community services personnel to address quality of life issues such as noise and overcrowding


Ø Review of our crime rates and policing methods by an independent group [This is discussed in more detail below.]

Ø Surveillance cameras and other technology. [There is sound technology available that will allow pinpoint detection and location of shots fired in real time.]

Ø Expand the Neighborhood Watch Program

It should be noted that the Eastport Civic Association has made great strides in the last area with over 100 new residents enrolled in the program.

The PSC recommended and the City has contracted with, the International City/County Management Association (ICMA) to do a comprehensive evaluation of our crime statistics, our police staffing and deployment, and other factors relevant to police effectiveness. The ICMA are nationally recognized authorities in these matters and their knowledge and expertise goes way beyond that of the City Council.

The final ICMA product will not be a report, but rather a menu of options. Each option will come with a likelihood-of-success rating and an associated cost. The City will make choices from that menu based on the projected impact on crime and on our ability to make and afford the changes.

I have received some questions and suggestions from the community that I believe capture the views and ideas of many of you.

Question 1. What is the plan to address the extraordinarily high crime rate in our city?

The plans that I have been working on are the PSC recommendations as presented above.
The crime problems didn’t come upon us overnight and they will not go away quickly or easily, but I believe implementation of the recommendations made by the PSC will significantly reduce the amount of crime in the City and In Eastport.

To recap the most important of those recommendations, we have or will take budget actions to help the Chief recruit and retain officers to get our force up to strength, we will purchase new technology to assist the force in their apprehension efforts and we will get outside expert help.

As the chief executive for the City, the Mayor has developed some additional crime prevention initiatives that have been well publicized. I support much of what she has recommended and I am working from the Council to assure implementation of many of these ideas.



Question 2. What is the long-range plan for improving our city’s public housing program?


The City does not have a public housing program. The Housing Authority of the City of Annapolis (HACA) and its programs are federal and are run by the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD).


The City does need to improve its relationship with HUD and its local authorities. Several Council members, including me, have asked the HACA staff to meet with us in a work session that is scheduled to occur in February. We want to hear from HACA directly what joint steps we can take to reduce the problems in and around the eleven housing complexes within the City.

It is my personal view that large concentrations of people living in warehouse type buildings is a poor design for both the program participants and the surrounding neighborhoods. In many areas, such as Montgomery and Baltimore Counties, and Chicago, the old public housing complexes are being torn down and replaced with a mix of workforce and section 8 residences. This approach will take time, dollars, and approval from HUD, but I feel it will have a direct impact on the level of crime.

The following four recommendations from one Eastport resident are proactive and thoughtful. I have added my comments.

Suggestion 1. Have police patrol in totally unmarked cars.

To some extent the Annapolis Police Department (APD) is already doing this, but doing more would help discourage the bad guys because they will not know when the police are about. Anything we can do to make it harder to be a criminal in the City is a good thing.

Suggestion 2. Have non-uniformed police patrol on foot, and on dirt bike motorcycles that can chase a suspect off the beaten path.

There are actually two important ideas in this suggestion. The single best thing done when Eastport had its mugging upswing last summer was to put plain-clothes officers on the street.

Bikes and small motorcycles that can be mounted on police cars is another good idea. APD already has some bikes on cars, but this is a low cost item that can be made available on all patrol cars.

Suggestion 3. Install concealed surveillance cameras at the intersection of Boucher and President Street and other key locations.

This is another good idea and we make the same suggestion, with a variation, in the PSC report. We add a recommendation for sound location devices. This allows triangulation on “shots fired” that are accurate to within two feet and are instantaneous. Police will not need to wait for those 268-4141 calls.

Suggestion 4. Hire some SWAT/Special Forces - type officers who are paid and trained to take on the challenge.

APD already has and uses these forces. In addition, we have mutual aid agreements with county and state departments if we need more support.

I share your concern that crime in our neighborhood is a most important issue and I shall continue to expend a great amount of my time and effort on making sure the council does everything it can to keep up pressure on the Police Chief and the Mayor to strength our policing efforts.

Ross Arnett, Alderman, Ward 8