Franklin City Neighbors

Acting Sheriff Fails to Communicate With Chiefs

Jul 23, 2002

Sheriff defends reach of his agency
Suburban chiefs say Clarke's going too far

By LINDA SPICE
of the Journal Sentinel staff
Last Updated: July 19, 2002

In his first four months in office, Milwaukee County Sheriff David A. Clarke Jr. has assigned detectives to suburbs to chart crime trends, promoted his squads' response to cellular 911 calls within municipalities and sent patrols to community festivals and parades.

Quotable
We cannot have individual agendas, and being in a position of leadership calls for sacrifice. This is about how we can best keep this community
safe.
- David A. Clarke Jr.,
Milwaukee County sheriff

Instead of trying to work together with the chiefs on how we can come up with a more efficient way to work together, he's decided to come in and not ask us what we want.
- Ken Bohn,
Franklin police chief


All of this after suburban police chiefs in April vehemently opposed a proposal to have the Sheriff's Department take over homicide investigations throughout the county.

Chiefs call it an unnecessary duplication of services. Clarke's response has been to cite state laws he says support his vision for a unified law enforcement community.

"We cannot have individual agendas, and being in a position of leadership calls for sacrifice," Clarke said. "This is about how we can best keep this community safe. I have asked the chiefs in the 19 agencies in this county to do the same."

Chiefs aired their concerns to municipal leaders in June before the Intergovernmental Cooperation Council, a consortium of Milwaukee County's 19 municipalities. Now Clarke has been invited by the council to argue his side at a meeting at 3 p.m. Monday at the Hales Corners library.

Some chiefs want to be sheriff
Clarke's message of collaboration is good, the chiefs say, but his delivery is off.

"He is the first sheriff that's come out and said, 'I'm going to be out there patrolling, and I don't care if you like it or not,' " said Cudahy Police Chief Mark Hayes, a challenger in the race for sheriff this fall. "He has managed in two months in office to tick off every police chief that's out there."

Another Clarke challenger, Franklin Police Chief Ken Bohn, said, "Instead of trying to work together with the chiefs on how we can come up with a more efficient way to work together, he's decided to come in and not ask us what we want."

Clarke characterizes resistance as a "natural phenomenon of change" and said he expects things will smooth out once the chiefs get comfortable with his approach.

"I'm open to compromise and discussion, but what I will not deal with is drawing lines in the sand," he said. "That's to the detriment of the people we're sworn to protect.

"My interest is not with whether somebody's feelings get hurt or somebody's ego gets wounded. My interest is not somebody's insecurity about what I'm doing."

Clarke touts his previous experience as a commander in the Milwaukee Police Department's Intelligence Division as a model for building collaboration between departments. He said that the Milwaukee Police Department has seven districts with various bureaus and divisions, noting that "all has to be tied together for the Milwaukee Police Department to be effective."

The same goes for the other municipal agencies, he said.

"This has to be tied together so there is an effective means of exchanging information and dissemination of information and that it's two-way," he said. "I made this very clear."

Clarke wants one area where criminal information, field interviews and raw data can be analyzed, collated and sorted. "Since I have countywide jurisdiction, I think it's most appropriate that happens here," he said.

He envisions a single computer system from which all officers could retrieve information from across borders as they work to tie together crimes and look for trends.

He would not include the city of Milwaukee under his expanding wing, however. Unlike the suburbs, Milwaukee has more resources, he said, and officers have the urban experience their suburban counterparts don't.

"We work hand in hand with the Milwaukee Police Department, but we don't have to assist to the degree that I have to with the suburban agencies because they don't have the resources," he said. "They don't have all the experience."

St. Francis Police Chief Victor Venus, who worked as Clarke's supervisor at the Milwaukee Police Department before retiring and going to St. Francis, respectfully disagrees.

"These people are not inadequate in the suburbs," Venus said. "They are schooled people and handle their cities well and respond within two minutes of the call. We know our communities. We are attached to our communities.

"I can't tell Sheriff Clarke what to do. If he wants to put radar cars on every corner in our cities, I can't stop him. But it's a duplication of efforts and not fiscally responsible."

John Fuchs, an attorney who represents both Fox Point and Glendale, said the sheriff is not "properly construing his statutory role" in expanding his department's duties.

"County law enforcement agencies may merely request the assistance of law enforcement personnel or may assist other law enforcement agencies," Fuchs said. "He can request assistance or he can assist. He cannot usurp."

The county's attorneys, however, have their own opinion on the matter.

"There doesn't appear to be a limitation to the sheriff by law on what law enforcement functions he can and cannot do," Jim Villa, chief of staff to County Executive Scott Walker, said after talking with county attorneys. Walker was out of town on Friday and unavailable for comment.

Greenfield Mayor Timothy Seider, president of the intergovernmental council, said that besides local chiefs' concerns, municipal officials question the potential liability, should sheriff's deputies assume more duties than requested.

Municipal leaders point to a case in West Milwaukee in 2000 in which police called for help from the sheriff's tactical squad to serve a warrant in a drug case. A woman at the home was shot by a deputy, and the village was later sued; the Sheriff's Department, under state statute, assumed no liability. The village settled the case for about $700,000 this year.

While Clarke said he'll leave questions about liability to the county's lawyers, he said he'll depend on his leadership skills to convince local chiefs to join him in his plans.

"It will take time. I'm a patient man, and it's going to take my leadership ability to bring people on board."

Appeared in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel on July 20, 2002.