Journal editors on Schultz rehiring.

Journal editors have weighed in on the rehiring of Ray Schultz as Chief of Police. link.

The premise they challenge is, police chiefs should change for the sake of change.

If there is a stink about a government, and there is a stink surrounding the Chavez administration, then there is a reason to change for change's sake.

Further, there are specific reasons to give Schultz the boot, and the editors named them;

1. "He wasn't open about punishments handed out in the evidence-room scandal,
2. forthright in explaining why so few of his 1,100-plus officers take calls,
3. logical in his defense of a $91,000 Suburban as a recruiting tool or
4. his off-duty officers who mucked up a Los Lunas crime scene, or
5. accountable in his release of inaccurate red-light camera stats.
6. He also stonewalled when APD's reserve officer program came under fire."

Most recently, and under oath, he denied the existence of the "blue wall of silence", link.

And then, of course, there is the elephant in the room; the comments on the backside of the Eye on Albuquerque, link, which everyone seems to want to ignore. As I wrote, those comments are either nonsense or not, link.

The fact they are being ignored lends credence to them.

The fact that Schultz won't even talk about a survey of the rank and file, a vote of confidence if you will, indicates that he doesn't think he would fair well if one were done. Consider the feather in his cap that a successful vote of confidence would represent, the unrest it would settle.

There are a lot of good reasons to bring in a new chief, or better yet promote someone from within the department.

Change for the sake of change, is not the least of them.




photo Mark Bralley