Voice of OC (https://voiceofoc.org/category/topics/public-safety/)
Westminster’s police chief, Ralph Ornelas, is on administrative leave pending the results of an outside investigation into “possible policy violations,” according to city officials.
U.S. Senator Kamala Harris, former state attorney general, defended her refusal to launch a large investigation into the Orange County District Attorney for the jailhouse informant program and said the county could handle it, reported the New York Times.
Santa Ana City Council members granted raises to police officers and sergeants totaling $25 million over the next two and a half years, without the ability to actually pay the $4.3 million cost for this fiscal year.
Santa Ana City Council members will vote Tuesday on the largest pay raises for the city’s police officers in more than a decade, totaling $25 million in taxpayer money over the next two and a half years and adding $12 million per year going forward in additional costs. The raises amount to a 13.6 percent to 19.3 percent increase in base pay for each officer and sergeant between now and July 2020, according to the city. Officers and sergeants with 15 to 19 years in law enforcement would receive raises totaling 16.5 percent, and those with 20 or more years would receive 19.3 percent in increases. Before the last set of raises in 2017, the median compensation for a Santa Ana officer totaled about $213,000 per year, including $111,000 in pay before overtime and $88,000 in benefits, according to city data published by Transparent California. The city staff report doesn’t offer an explanation for the raises, beyond saying they resulted from negotiations between the police officers’ union and City Council.
Former District Attorney Tony Rackauckas demoted his Chief of Staff Susan Kang Schroeder, along with at least several other people, on his way out of the office in an attempt to ensure they had jobs, but Schroeder resigned Jan. 14, according to DA Todd Spitzer.
But City Hall’s day-to-day leadership remained in limbo.
At the request of District Attorney Todd Spitzer, police chiefs and the Sheriff are working on a policy for all departments to uniformly handle the new state law that creates transparency in law enforcement discipline records, but is opposed by many police unions.
Orange County’s new District Attorney, Todd Spitzer, said during his swearing-in ceremony Monday night there will be sweeping changes at the prosecutor’s office.
Many Orange County cities are struggling to maintain budgets that keep, or minimally cut services and employees, while trying to keep up with growing law enforcement and fire pension spending.
The year-end meeting featured goodbyes to supervisors Todd Spitzer and Shawn Nelson, criticism of the all supervisors over the deaths of more than 200 homeless people this year, and questions from the incoming DA about wiretapping and alleged conflicts of interest related to a contractor hired by the outgoing district attorney and illegal surveillance of elected officials by a police union’s law firm.