Carl Mumpower for Police

asheville | copwatch | repost Sunday October 07, 2007 13:47 by anonymous

In search of integrity, fairness, respect and professionalism

In search of integrity, fairness, respect and professionalism
by Carl Mumpower, Guest commentary
published October 2, 2007 12:15 am
http://www.citizen-times.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=...inion

This is an editorial that the Citizen-Times published by conservative and racist city councilor Carl Mumpower.
Know your enemy.

In the back of most cars you’ll find a spare tire. For most of us it is a neglected nuisance that takes up space and adds weight to the vehicle. It’s not something the average driver thinks about or appreciates until he or she is stranded on a rainy night. Then that spare tire becomes everything — a response not unlike the one we have for our police.

Asheville has had a fair share of recent police controversies. There have been high profile arrests of protestors, several unsolved witnessed shootings and a “report no one wants to own� questioning police department race relations. I personally added to the mix with an early year challenge to a pattern of city and police administrative complacency in enforcing our drug laws in public housing and other facilities. Most recently there was the City Council meeting where two officers were casually accused of murder.

Easy targets

People who wear dark uniforms and shiny badges make great targets for all sorts of shooters — most especially those who traffic in hard drugs. The inevitable desperation and selfishness of dealers, addicts and their supporters ensures a host of dangers for those trying to stop that activity. It is to our collective shame that we continue to support open-air drug markets that place our children and vulnerable neighborhoods and the men and women charged to protect them in harms way.

Overwhelmed system

“I’ve got your back� is not a phrase used by a progressive City Council majority that stepped away from its earlier commitment to “eliminate our open-air drug market.� It’s not any better in a Raleigh body that dodges responsibility for deconstructing our mental health system and neglecting our court system with similar enthusiasm. Ask any police officer about the impact of an underfunded and overwhelmed judicial system that offers little deterrent to bad guys who know the system is weak and full of holes. They will share that the biggest bad guys sometimes wear suits.

Community failings

Other bullets come in the form of criticism and neglect. Most of us pass “attaboys� to our police with about the same frequency and enthusiasm with which we check the pressure in those spare tires. Too many of our community’s visible black leaders embrace all opportunities to shoot with anti-police rhetoric that overlooks the reality of black Ashevillians as the most frequent victims of crime. We have ministers who actively advocate “don’t snitch� policies that ensure their own communities remain breeding grounds for new generations of criminals versus young men and women propelled to a future of hope. The results aggrevate a climate of distrust for the police that, combined with real race relation failures, ensures that black young men and women from our community avoid the challenges and opportunities of service in a place they are needed most.

Citizen oversight?

Then there are the voices of the community who persistently call for citizen oversight authority and passive police response to illegal protest activities, vagrant misbehaviors and the drug culture’s public indulgences. George Orwell once observed that, “To abjure violence, it is necessary to have no experience of it.� His reflection offers a glimpse into the absence of realism in those who seek to paralyze our police department when the real goal should be an honest and effective police department.

A community gets the crime it is willing to accept and the enforcement it is willing to support, and we all have a part to play in that equation. The next time you walk or drive by a police officer, remember your spare tire and consider a smile, wave or thank you. Their badge covers a heart that makes daily invisible sacrifices to your safety. That uniform identifies a man or woman who, far more often than not, is a prince of the city.

Carl Mumpower is a military veteran who currently serves on the Asheville City Council. He lives in Asheville.