The morale here at the PD has been low now for about the past 2 years. A new Chief took over about 4 years ago. Before that the current Chief worked part-time for the dept for several years going on and off full-time employment as well. This Chief started out ok but now he only focuses on the negative. He is always threatening to terminate officers if they do not comply with his opinions. Yes I said opinions not policies. He writes memos and posts them on the roll call room board and if we don't sign it he threatens termination of employment and or "disciplinary action". He is always bad mouthing fellow officers behind their backs. Speaking of what they did wrong on a traffic stop or an arrest so on and so forth. Many times he doesn't even know what he is talking about. However, he never brings it to the officer's attention in which he is complaining about. Nine times out of ten the person(s) he is complaining about does more work than he can think about. The Chief spends more time trying to catch us violating policies than people breaking the law. To date the Chief has wrote two traffic citations and has three arrests and he is the one speaking of "lack of productivity". I know the Chief's job is to supervise his employees and enforce policies and procedures but that is not his only job.
There was a time an officer got written up for not completely filling out his logsheet. Which consisted of him not putting his ending mileage of the cruiser on his logsheet several diferent occasions. The Chief went around to other PD's and let them know how he had to write an "employee up". This officer was in court and was approached by one of the officers to which the Chief spoke to and asked him if he was going to appeal his "write up" on such a bs charge. At this time the officer did not know he was being written up. He went in and worked 3rd shift and received his write up the next morning.
I could go on and on for so many more paragraphs it is unbelievable. It just seems that the PD is never going to get any better. I just keep plugging away with eyes on my six at all times. I love this job and feel the dept needs help with leadership if you know what I mean. Does anybody out there have any legal advice for a small PD w/o any legal representation for the Chief coercing us into signing memos on what he wants without any real backing to his requests. The mayor advised he has an "open door" policy to bring forth any complaints that we feel is necessary but I dont like to go out of chain of command. Stuck in a rock and a hard place. We have a dept meeting coming up and would like any advice on how to handle the way he forces us to sign receipt of his memo stating we will do what he says or be terminated. I am just tired of always being forced to sign stuff I don't agree with but dont want to lose my job either. Any ideas or similar situations out there for the heavy badged chief?
There was a time an officer got written up for not completely filling out his logsheet. Which consisted of him not putting his ending mileage of the cruiser on his logsheet several diferent occasions. The Chief went around to other PD's and let them know how he had to write an "employee up". This officer was in court and was approached by one of the officers to which the Chief spoke to and asked him if he was going to appeal his "write up" on such a bs charge. At this time the officer did not know he was being written up. He went in and worked 3rd shift and received his write up the next morning.
I could go on and on for so many more paragraphs it is unbelievable. It just seems that the PD is never going to get any better. I just keep plugging away with eyes on my six at all times. I love this job and feel the dept needs help with leadership if you know what I mean. Does anybody out there have any legal advice for a small PD w/o any legal representation for the Chief coercing us into signing memos on what he wants without any real backing to his requests. The mayor advised he has an "open door" policy to bring forth any complaints that we feel is necessary but I dont like to go out of chain of command. Stuck in a rock and a hard place. We have a dept meeting coming up and would like any advice on how to handle the way he forces us to sign receipt of his memo stating we will do what he says or be terminated. I am just tired of always being forced to sign stuff I don't agree with but dont want to lose my job either. Any ideas or similar situations out there for the heavy badged chief?
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