When Policing Becomes Political
Where should the line be drawn?
Conservatives agree that law enforcement is vitally important to the safety and prosperity of any society. We have enormous respect for the men and women in uniform who put themselves in danger to maintain that safety. That raises the question of how far that respect should go when it comes to questions of governance, policy, and taxation.
As subject matter experts in the field of law enforcement, current and retired personnel clearly have a lot to offer the discourse about how best to use the finite resources that municipalities have at their disposal. However, they can’t be the only voices in the room. Our republican system of government invites people from all walks of life to weigh in on decisions that affect the community.
I wrote last year about how former Ada County Sheriff Gary Raney and former (and now current) Boise Police Chief Ron Winegar used their status as law enforcement veterans to attack Janice McGeachin as a radical extremist, insinuating that she supported white supremacist militias and cop killers.
I think most people will agree that the way Raney and Winegar used their badges for crass political purposes was despicable, which means we agree that it’s possible for law enforcement personnel to go too far when it comes to politics. The question is, where is that line drawn?
That question has come up in the Eagle mayoral and council races this year. Eagle contracts with the Ada County Sheriff’s Office for police coverage, which means that sheriff’s deputies are assigned as Eagle police officers. It’s a good arrangement, because Eagle has the resources of Ada County at its back while only paying for what is necessary for our city.
The contract with the Ada County Sheriff’s Office is up for renewal this year, and so Mayor Jason Pierce has been negotiating with the office based on a budget that was approved by the city council. Unfortunately, that contract negotiation has been turned into a political football. Councilman Brad Pike is using the the contract and questions about police coverage in his campaign against Mayor Pierce.
Detractors of the mayor on social media have accused Eagle of having a policing problem for several months. They say that the number of officers compared to our population and land area is much lower than other municipalities. They say that the mayor’s negotiations, in which he is asking the sheriff to cover more policing of state highways, is putting the lives of Eagle citizens at risk.
Councilman Pike picked up this political football and ran with it, declaring a campaign for mayor based on public safety. That football has been batted around ever since, with Pike (or an associate) publishing a letter from Eagle Police Chief Ryan Wilkie to the mayor and council, and the three other council members publishing an open letter of their own in response.
Detractors of the mayor complained that only a few days remained before the previous contract expired, insinuating that Eagle could soon be without police coverage entirely. However, in the last ten years, negotiations over the police contract have often gone beyond the October 1 deadline, with no break in coverage. That did not stop the needless fearmongering, however.
The war of words spilled into this week’s city council meeting, as Pike and Pierce argued over police coverage and funding, before the council voted unanimously to approve the contract. Watch the whole exchange here:
When the issue of the open letter by Council Members Charlie Baun, Helen Russell, and Melissa Gindlesperger came up, city attorney Victor Villegas gave his opinion that no violation of open meetings laws had occurred. Pike disagreed, suggesting that by collaborating on the letter, the other three council members engaged in closed-door discussions of city business. This, of course, after he defended the public release of Chief Wilkie’s letter to the mayor and council.
While I don’t believe that Councilman Pike is being disingenuous in his belief that Eagle needs more police to maintain public safety, I am disappointed in the way in which this vitally important issue was used for political gamesmanship. Public safety is one of the paramount duties of a city council, yet the answer is not always “more cops”. Eagle is still a fairly safe city. The mayor, council, and citizens can and should debate what level of law enforcement is appropriate to maintain that safety. But let’s do it respectfully, and not use it as just another piece of ammunition for a political campaign.
I’ll have more on the Eagle mayor and council races soon. Subscribe now so you don’t miss a single post!
Kudos to Brian for this article. Thank you for bringing it up. I may need to dovetail on it a bit to offer a wider periphery and I am always disappointed when we trust the uninformed to make decisions based on law, it never ends well. I am also extremely concerned when it comes to things made political which in my view should never happen. I was introduced recently to the fact that sheriffs have to declare a party and if removed, it is up to the party to declare their 3 best candidates and we wonder why we are in the trouble we are in? Next, we somehow think that a city needs to contract with a county for policing because people need to be policed? We should all know that police are an instrument created to keep the peace within the city once defined by Sir Robert Peele but what about the proper role of the sheriff in America? When you review Peele's his writings what you find is that, like anything else, America has bastardized that too or even incorporated it. Policing to me is simply the need to force people to be good people, or today to force people to comply or be seen as bad people. Policing, like all government offices have proper limits and if they are exceeded, they are now defenders of the state against the very people that fund them. Of course, I could go off on this issue for hours and this isn't my platform but there is far more to consider here than just the politics of the thing and I think Brian just gave me a great start on how to connect it all. I am pleased that Brian took the time to even mention such a seemingly controversial topic but if people don't become more informed about more, we are totally screwed but it is also important to know that we are not in a state without hope because the measure of success comes from you.
Mayor Pierce has been outstanding, transparent, and without guile in all his work as mayor and as a person who loves the community. He is being smeared by opponents who resent Eagle’s conservative values and deserves to be overwhelmingly re-elected.