Moral hazard in Metro's purchasing past

One definition of "moral hazard" is taking undue risks with resources acquired when incentives exist to do so. I'm wondering whether the Mayor's Office, the police department, and Metro Council (34 members) realized that definition in 2009 when purchasing the old Frensley car dealership in order to flip it into the West MNPD Precinct.

Neighborhood leaders were skeptical and challenged Karl Dean's budget man Rich Riebeling and former police chief Ronal Serpas. They wondered if the cost was fair market. They wondered about the site's flood-proneness. They wondered about the political patronage behind the deal.

CM Buddy Baker, a buddy of Bob Frensley, spearheaded the effort even though the car dealership was not in his district. An ethics complaint was filed against Mr. Baker for allegedly concealing the information that the former police commander of the West Precinct was a trustee for Bob Frensley. Mr. Riebeling pushed the deal through without a detailed site plan, and he was surly and arrogant toward concerned neighborhoods, acting like he was going to put down $4+ million on a cheaper property simply because he could with or without public support.

The incentives for moral hazard were there.

Then came the Great Flood of 2010 that proved community leaders were exactly right to be skeptical of the risk Metro Nashville was willing to take for the West Precinct plan. So then, extra money was needed for flood mitigation of a HQ on a flood plain at a time when Metro was tearing down buildings on other flood plain. But Metro could not or would not spare enough money to provide a large enough community meeting space to allow public meetings for many to attend.

The flood was revealing of the undue risks Riebeling et al. were willing to take with public funds to ignore planning and to patronize the circle of good old boys built up around Bob Frensley through the years. Yet, it was also incentive to continue to take risks to mitigate the costs of keeping MNPD on Charlotte Ave flood plain and stay callous toward the community.

Jump forward to 2013, property reappraisal time.

If you are a property owner, you have likely received your tax appraisal from Metro in the past week. Mike Peden looked at a tax appraisal for a property near to the West Precinct and emailed me this morning:

The tax appraisal for the property next door to the West Precinct on Charlotte went down from $3,816,900 to $3,452,100. (5330 Charlotte Ave)

That seems strange since the tax appraisal on the land metro purchased was $2.88 million and they paid $4.2 million. I thought the justification for that was that the property was under appraised.

In a separate email, Mike wrote that the appraisal of Wendell's Restaurant (5300 Charlotte)--where CM Baker like to hold court occasionally--dropped 6% ($437,200 to $411,900).

Smells to me like moral hazard drove the Frensley dealership deal.

Mayor Karl Dean's bean counter investigation has become an obstacle to community policing

The subject of increasing crimes just outside of the Central Police Precinct in areas north and west of Salemtown came up during last night's Salemtown Neighbors business meeting. During that discussion a police officer mentioned to the group that the Metro investigation of crime stat collection (which was launched by Mayor Karl Dean after former Chief Ronal Serpas left to take the helm of the New Orleans force) has left some MNPD confusion on how to document some crimes, so they end up defaulting to one category like burglary with the idea that they can go back later and change it to comply.

I indicated before that I believe that this investigation was started because two elected officials in particular--Jim Gotto and Karl Dean--have political aspirations for future elections. Allow me to suggest that raising doubts about local law enforcement in the absence of lightning rods like Serpas gives them both greater visibility and the appearance of the mantle of reform. What is not adequately reported by the local press, which has its own penchant for pre-election melodrama, is that Nashville joins other Tennessee municipalities with statistics gathering methods at odds with those of TBI. The investigation looks like a distraction.

Also underreported in Nashville is news that the new New Orleans Chief of Police is enjoying the same skyrocketing public-satisfaction numbers that he got here in Nashville in spite of some controversial policies on traffic stops and his hard-nosed tendency to challenge governing officials at the local and state levels. The positive numbers do not help Mr. Gotto's and Mayor Dean's witch hunts locally, which is probably why no one is calling attention to them here.

However, if last night's Salemtown meeting is any indication, Metro's investigation of the police department's crime-gathering methods is actually hurting neighborhoods like Salemtown. There was a palpable air of confusion last night given that all burglaries reported might not actually be burglaries because state and local bean counters cannot agree on how crimes should be categorized, as if that matters to victims and potential victims.

Mayor Dean, who ran his last election on lowering crime in Nashville not on analyzing how that crime gets reported, needs to stop using the police and their number crunching as a political football in a match to win a second term. Honest discrepancies with the TBI can be worked out. At a neighborhood level I have not sensed that anyone really cares about whether what Metro Police call a robbery TBI calls a burglary after the fact.

Neighborhoods do care about clear communication from the police about crimes impinging on our communities. And we do care that career politicians keep from obstructing that communication.

A Study in Contrast

[I]t's a cheap heart tugging trick to say "it's for the children" .... [The] whole "education is the most important thing" motto was way wrong and arrogant, to boot. How many people could look face to face with a firefighter or policeman and tell THEM that education was more important than protecting life and limb?

- - Substitute Metro School Board member Kay Brooks reflecting on the September 13, 2005 sales tax referendum

Educating children is the most important thing that we as a people can do, and I think that the long term solution to crime reduction and abatement is education. So I am all for education .... This referendum is something I am very in favor of ... to give education opportunities to children is something that I believe in.

- - Metro Police Chief Ronal Serpas reflecting on the September 13, 2005 sales tax referendum

Begging Some Suck-Up When The Media Gets Suckered

Employing his usual sardonic method, Nashville Scene reporter John Spragens took his aim off of Pedro Garcias this week and drew a bead on Police Chief Ronal Serpas:

Now, to be fair, we don’t necessarily disagree with Serpas’ philosophical critique of the cash-strapped, sensation-driven news media [which Serpas made at an Officers Association conference last fall]. But coming from a guy who’s never met a camera he didn’t like—the guy whose first action as Nashville police chief was to hold a press conference with the grieving family of a long-missing teen—well, it rings a little hollow.

Ostensibly, this sounds like a critique of Serpas, but if this really is the wag-the-dog indictment it seems to be, then who is to blame for a press that uncritically provides photo ops for government officials who live and die on photo ops?

We expect public relations from administrators. We expect a press that in the words of former CBS reporter Tom Fenton "punches holes" in public relations before and in the act. Spragens seems to be sniping after a non-issue: Serpas is guilty of both acting like an administrator--not like a reporter--and criticizing reporters. What other option would Spragens have? That Serpas owes the "fourth estate" some kind of quid-pro-quo suck-up because of all that they do for him? That's just silly. Spragens, perhaps unwittingly, has only indicted his own guild: it is nobody's fault but their own when they allow themselves to be tools in some public relations pitch.

Would A New Southeast Police Station Result In Cuts In Other Precincts?

One of the resolutions passed by Metro Council on Tuesday night requests that Police Chief Ronal Serpas respond within 60 days to the question of the feasibility of building a new precinct station in southeast Davidson County.

When the resolution's sponsors rose to speak in favor of their resolution during pre-vote discussion, they acknowledged that the southeast portion is not particularly problematic or crime-ridden, but that they were attempting to be proactive and have police presence in place if and when crime did go up with the increase in population they appear to be experiencing. Co-sponsor Tommy Bradley mentioned Chief Serpas's current policy of focusing patrols to those neighborhoods with the most phone calls to police. Bradley also said that he hoped that that policy might be reconsidered in the future for the sake of providing southeast Davidson County with more regular patrols based in a local station.

Our neighborhood watch in Salemtown has adjusted to the current policy of focusing attention on those neighborhoods with the most calls, and many of us call whenever something suspicious seems to be happening on our streets. We generally get good response times from police and more patrols have tended to follow for stints afterwards. It remains to be seen whether we might have to readjust if the Police Chief reconsiders along Bradley's wishes.

However, it sounds like the need for a southeast police station is not a matter of policy but one of money. I would say that the southeast Council members (Bradley, Vivian Wilhoite, and Sam Coleman) should organize initiatives with their peers to raise revenues to hire more cops and to start a capital project rather than encouraging changes that might siphon off police response and patrols from other areas. The last thing any of us need with the recent spike in Nashville's violent crime rate is a force spread too thin.

Giving Credit Where It's Due, Updated

There is no doubt that Chief Ronal Serpas is a lightning rod. As a change agent in the Metro Police Department, he has attracted a lot of controversy. And there is some valid criticism of his methods.

The entire crowd attending Chief Serpas's keynote at the Mayor's Conference on Saturday came away unscathed. No lightning struck. In fact, the presentation was a bit dry. That was perhaps due to the possibility that Chief Serpas was upstaged by Mayor Purcell's sermon-like depth-charge announcement not to seek a third term. Or is could have been as fellow blogger John H. whispered to me during Serpas' talk: showing multiple PowerPoint slides of multi-celled tables with a tidal wave of data instead of simple bullets is not crowd-friendly.

But I did take two significant stats away from the presentation that should mitigate a lot of the recent hooey we hear lately from those who whine about being more prone now to speeding tickets because of Serpas's aggressive traffic policies. According to the Chief, 22% (50,000) of all the traffic stops made under Serpas lead to a warning, not a citation. In a city where I've heard people complain about how bad "Tennessee drivers" are, that seems relatively generous leeway. (Of course, that stat doesn't tell us how many of those warnings issued occurred as the result of attractive women drivers who claim--like one of my neighbors has--"to talk their way out" of a ticket by being flirtatious with cops).

But the second stat was even more impressive to me: 13% (30,000) of all traffic stops made during his tenure have lead to arrests for more significant crimes committed. Now, the ends don't justify means when the means are too unbearable or unfair. But pulling speeders and other minor traffic violators over as a means of making more significant arrests is not an undue burden; especially, for those of us who live in the city and expect our patrol officers to make routine traffic stops to discourage the riff-raff, who usually come from outside the neighborhoods.

One of my otherwise lawful neighbors was pulled over in Salemtown recently he claims because of his rumbling muscle car, but having left his license at home, he was given a citation. However, the Central Precinct reports that several arrests have been made in Salemtown during such routine traffic stops. It is unfortunate when otherwise good people get cited for traffic violations, but if you drive a car you must accept the risks that come with it; and those risks increase when you violate even the most trivial traffic laws. For some to argue that we should forestall the possibility of nabbing and incarcerating suspects with serious criminal histories just so that minor violators can enjoy their entitlements to minor violations is just plain silly.

My neighbor accepted his ticket gracefully; there are others who act like spoiled brats. I have very little sympathy for those who grouse and beef about police at traffic stops (disclaimer in light of Blake Wylie's comment below: while Blake has bellyached about traffic stops in the past, he himself has never received a traffic citation and should not be confused with those who have received or will receive past or future traffic citations). Here's why my sympathies fail:

• Whiners need to be cautious about their bellyaching lest they come across as anti-police-protection.
• If the "Debby Downers" are so concerned about robberies, then they need to take action and work with the police when suspicious activity is occurring. Those of us who actually live in the city to which weekend revellers come to party understand that crime can be very real on these streets. We also understand that we have a Police Chief who places a premium on stats. So, what do we do? We watch our neighborhoods and report anything suspicious that we see. Increasing the number of our reports increases patrols. If we don't see increased patrols, we work with our precinct officers to get more. If you think certain areas you patronize need more patrols, get off your patioed ass and out from behind your top-shelf Marguerita and do something about it.
• Finally, the bitchers need to realize, as Chief Serpas reported on Saturday, that robberies are trending up in cities across the country. That doesn't excuse our local police from protecting us, but I would bet the national trend is not the result of every other police chief having an aggressive traffic stop policy.

Serpas, like any human being, deserves criticism as well as credit. But when I hear all the kicking and screaming about traffic stops, I am reminded that Sammy Davis, Jr. more effectively sang my response: "Don't do the crime if you can't do the time ... uh, no, no, no. Don't do it." That applies to speeders as well as robbers. Traffic violators who complain about the consequences of violating traffic laws and excuse themselves by asking the police to go chase down "real criminals" don't seem willing to accept personal responsibility for their own behavior.

10/24/2005, Noon Update: I have added a qualification about Blake Wylie's "grousing and beefing" in light of his comment below. But that disclaimer does not change the validity of my argument about those who complain about traffic stops, whether the complainers actually received tickets or not. Those who complain but don't receive traffic tickets should not minimize the traffic violations of others and should not impugn traffic stops by crying for less stops and more patrols while the rest of us are actually doing things to increase patrols.

More Council Budget Chickens Home To Roost; Cuts To Metro Police Probable, Says Nashville City Paper

The Nashville City Paper reports that Metro Finance Director David Manning is finding that the substitute budget cuts passed by Metro Council "don't work." They "don't work" to the tune of $5 million. Consequently, Metro Departments are being asked to slash their budgets to offset the gap.

One of those Departments upon which neighborhoods rely for safety and security, the Metro Police, will reportedly cut 18 full-time employees, which will decrease the time that police officers spend on front line patrol since officers would be expected to assume more clerical and administrative functions at the stations. According to both Manning and Police Chief Ronal Serpas, those cuts will create "public safety problem." The only real improvements budgeted by the Council will be upgrades to the Department's information system.

These cuts in police service to our community join a growing list of other Metro services documented here on Enclave. I will be following up with the Central Precinct to see if their patrols and response time will be adversely affected. With the recent spike in crime because of the closing of John Henry Hale homes and the otherwise rapid transition of the area, these cuts are bad news for us.

Perhaps when Metro Council members called the budget they recently passed a "substitute" budget, they meant that urban residents should substitute prayers for safety in place of police presence. If we're going to lose patrols, we might not have a prayer.