Police chief: Time for real solution to crime
By John Joyce
Published in News on September 6, 2015 1:50 AM
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Goldsboro interim Police Chief Mike West discusses the recent spike in shootings in the city.
Goldsboro interim police chief Mike West draws his hands to face.
His chin rests on his clasped hands; his fingers interwoven like the lives of so many of the citizens he is sworn to protect -- the shooters, their victims and the families of both.
Since Aug. 1, the Goldsboro Police Department has investigated 100 reports of shots fired. That figure accounts for some duplicate calls, but also includes the 17 people who have been shot -- three of whom have been killed since Aug. 8.
And police officials say those numbers are increasing.
Short-term solutions like increasing patrols and deploying a mobile command center have been tried and they have failed, West said. The time has come for a long-term solution.
"I'm fed up. And the community should be fed up, too," he said.
West is calling for the police department, the city and the community to come together to work on a multi-pronged solution to a problem facing the city as a whole.
"My thoughts are that we -- and when I say we, not only the police department but I think the city to include city hall and the other departments that feel the need to be involved in it -- (hold) some sort of community meeting with pillars of the community or community leaders," West said. "Lets have a discussion about what all of us can do as a group to see if we can solve this problem or at least address this problem."
City manager Scott Stevens said he and the city are open to trying anything.
Stevens said he was involved in community meetings with the police department in 2012 when the city was in the midst of a streak of violence that amounted to 13 murders that year. The meetings themselves did not necessarily stop the violence, but Stevens said it was and still is important to have that exchange of ideas.
"Will it stop the amount of violence and people hurting each other, I don't think so. But I think it is a matter of, the more we talk with people -- community groups or churches, neighborhoods -- the more we can understand both sides," Stevens said.
Meetings alone are not the answer, West said. And they have to be focused on the real issues. In the past, community meetings have sometimes devolved into sessions of blame-shifting and finger-pointing that need to be avoided this time around, he said.
"I don't think that is the discussion we need to be having," he said.
West said the recent spike in violence is not necessarily a failure on the part of the police department, but rather a break-down in communication between the community and law enforcement.
The situation is starting to improve, he said, but there is work left to be done.
"We need to energize the community. And we're seeing a little bit of it where we are getting a little bit more support through our social media," he said.
That trend needs to continue.
The trend that needs to stop is applying short-term solutions to an issue that needs focused and sustained attention, West said.
"We're always adjusting and moving, and it is just not effective."
Increasing patrols is not a permanent solution, West said. The patrol division is short five officers, meaning other officers and higher-ranking officials within the department are being tasked with filling patrol slots on shifts wherever deficiencies exist.
But when a shooting takes place in a certain area of town, patrols are stepped up in that area the next few days and nights. Then another person is shot in a another part of the city and the patrols are shifted to that area. It is not an effective solution, West said.
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The issue of rising violence and criminal activity in the city impacts everyone, regardless of race, age, socio-economic status or zip code.
West said own family has been impacted.
On a recent outing while driving past the Walmart at North Spence and Royall avenues, West's 8-year-old son asked his father if that was the Walmart where a recent shooting had taken place.
"We had to talk about it. And that concerns me. We've got children now that if they hear about it, they don't want to go in the area of Walmart now because they're afraid. It's affecting everyone," he said.
Potential solutions begin with prevention, but do not end there, he said, adding the police department and city officials are starting to see that citizens are frustrated.
"They are fed up. And we need to ride this wave of support and the frustration, and we need to get in front of it, and foster it and keep going with it."
Police presence in the schools is only part of the solution. The GREAT program -- Gang Resistance, Education and Awareness Training -- in the elementary schools and the placement of school resource officers in city middle and high schools have a positive impact, but the effort cannot stop there, he said.
"If something had been done 23 years ago and we had stuck to it, maybe we wouldn't be facing these problems that we are now," he said.
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The problem reaches back farther than the time West has spent in uniform. Gangs existed in the city prior to his joining the police department, and they continue to exist today.
"As far as the gangs, we've had gangs here for 23 years just that I know of, since I have been on the department. It's just that back then they were the Georgia Avenue Boys, or it was called Webtown. It was just a group of individuals," he explained.
He said the structure of gangs today is similar to those in years past, but the mentality is different
"Do we have gangs now? Yes. Do we have members of these gangs that say that they are the Bloods or the Crips? Yes. But is one gang after another gang? No."
And because the local gangs identify with and identify as nationally affiliated gangs, they gain a sense of confidence from that. But a lack of internal structure leads to less self-control from within, he said.
"One thing about the gangs we've got here, and I don't want to make them feel empowered when I say this ... what we are finding here is the gang members we've got here are not organized. Today they will be a Blood, tomorrow they will be a Crip, the next day they will be something (else).They interact with each other. Then one of them will, for whatever reason, get a beef with another one. Then one individual goes after another one. And it's not because they are opposing gang members. It is because, 'You're the one I'm after and you're the one I'm going to get,'" West explained.
The interlacing of individual arguments between members of sometimes-rival, sometimes-associated gangs makes it hard for law enforcement to say the conflicts are gang-related because it is really one person acting in aggression toward one other person, West said
"As former Chief Jeff Stewart used to say, 'We can do something for two weeks and do it well, but then we've got to shift our focus.' And we can't continue to do that," West said.
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West doesn't know if he will still be sitting in the chief's chair six months from now. He is not sure he wants to be. But he decided when he took the position as interim chief that rather than occupy a chair for six months, he was going to be proactive and productive.
Stevens agreed, saying West should feel free to make any minor changes he sees fit and to be thinking about major changes that might better equip the department, the city or the community to deal with the ongoing violence.
"He and I have talked about that and I told him he ought to run the department like he is the chief, and if he wants to make major changes we need to talk about that. Now, minor changes, he doesn't need to talk to me about that, but I am not interested in him just 'holding it together' for nine months," Stevens said.
If the next chief -- should West fail or decline to be appointed permanently to the chief's position after the first of the year -- wants to continue those changes he or she can. Or, if that person chooses to go another way, he or she can do that too, West said. In the meantime, the work needs to be done to try to reign in some of the violence, he said.
"Let's go ahead and put it in place and start working on it," he said. "Short-term stuff at times is good, but I think the way the situation is now we need long-term (solutions.) We need to get into the schools, get into the community."
From then on, he said, it is imperative that the police, along with the city and the community, remain consistent.
"And if they don't see results in the first month or two, and if we don't see results, don't abandon it. It's a good plan. Let's keep going with it. And we'll take our lumps," he said.
"But we've just got to stay the course."