This comes as no surprise to many of us reading the postings on this site. The people on here have been screaming it's time to get rid of the PBA for a long time. When the union controls the city, residents, and legal authorities in a city it's time for change and our elected officials went right along with the PBA and voted not to restrict arbitration in cases involving the police.
This is the most blaten slap in the residents taxpaying face I've ever seen. I mean, come on, WE foot the bill for these cops and the politicians are suppose to be our elected 'care takers'. Bullsh**!!! I say vote them all out and vote the ones in who have ba**s!
When the INSANE are running the ASYLUM In individuals, insanity is rare; but in groups, parties, nations and epochs, it is the rule. -- Friedrich Nietzsche
“How fortunate for those in power that people never think.” Adolph Hitler
Driver allegedly on phone caught after brief chase SCHENECTADY — A traffi c stop for cellphone use turned into a brief high speed chase through Hamilton Hill Wednesday, authorities said. Officers attempted to stop Jamel Johnson, 19, of 8th Avenue, on Craig Street at about 6:15 p.m. for allegedly using his cellphone while driving. Johnson sped off down Strong Street, passing Jerry Burrell Park, before ditching his vehicle at Schenectady and Albany streets, according to papers filed in court. He then climbed through an Albany Street window into a residence where he did not live. Offi - cers kicked in the door and arrested him without further incident. Johnson was charged with resisting arrest and second-degree aggravated unlicensed operation, misdemeanors. He also faces a host of traffic violations.
I must shamefully admit that I was riding down a side road in Rottedam last week talking on my cell phone.(well not exactly) I can't put my cell on speaker until the other party picks up first. Don't know why...just the way it is. So there I was with the dreaded cell attached to my ear, waiting for the other party to pick up, when a car went by and they started to YELL at me for using my cell.
Well, I wanted to yell back, 'Listen jerk, if ya had your eyes on the road like you're suppose to, you wouldn't have seen me using my cell'!
When the INSANE are running the ASYLUM In individuals, insanity is rare; but in groups, parties, nations and epochs, it is the rule. -- Friedrich Nietzsche
“How fortunate for those in power that people never think.” Adolph Hitler
SCHENECTADY Police arbitration bill vetoed Commissioner retains sole discipline authority BY KATHLEEN MOORE Gazette Reporter
Public Safety Commissioner Wayne Bennett can dole out discipline to city police officers without fear of being overturned by an arbitrator, thanks to a veto issued by Gov. Eliot Spitzer on Wednesday. Spitzer vetoed the Legislature’s latest attempt to require arbitration in police discipline matters, saying arbitration is not the best way to handle police misbehavior. “I believe the head of a police department is better suited than an arbitration panel to decide such matters,” Spitzer wrote in his veto message. He also said arbitration “could significantly disrupt proper management” of the police if arbitrators overturn the police commissioner’s disciplinary decisions. That was exactly the argument that Schenectady officials made when they asked the governor to veto the bill. Mayor Brian U. Stratton said corruptible police officers in the Schenectady Police Department were encouraged to break the law when arbitrators repeatedly forced the city to rehire fired individuals. “They feel they can do basically whatever they want because the arbitrators are going to rule in their favor,” Stratton said when he lobbied against the bill. Local officials were thrilled by the decision, so much so that police Chief Michael N. Geraci personally brought the news to Corporation Counsel L. John Van Norden. Geraci had to track down Van Norden at an evening Board of Zoning Appeals meeting and slip him a note to deliver the message. Van Norden said later that he had been fairly sure Spitzer would veto the bill. “After the state trooper veto, we were confident,” he said. “In that, he used pretty much the same wording as the Court of Appeals.” In his veto, Spitzer said the Court of Appeals was correct when it ruled in 2006 that discipline should remain with the civilian leaders of a police force, not independent arbitrators. The Court of Appeals said paramilitary groups such as police must have strong leadership, and those leaders must be able to discipline officers who misbehave. Spitzer agreed, writing that “the desire to avoid leaving important policy decisions in the hands of an unaccountable arbitrator” is particularly important in police disciplinary issues. In essence, the court ruling eliminated arbitration in police matters. The ruling erased any contractual agreements that limit the disciplinary authority of a civilian in charge of local police.
Wow now a police officer can finally be disciplined by his boss instead of just having his hand slapped by an arbitrator.
What a concept, huh? That it how it works in the real world! Gee, will the arbitrators lose their jobs now?
When the INSANE are running the ASYLUM In individuals, insanity is rare; but in groups, parties, nations and epochs, it is the rule. -- Friedrich Nietzsche
“How fortunate for those in power that people never think.” Adolph Hitler
EDITORIALS Spitzer saves Sch’dy from its own ‘reps’
The city of Schenectady owes Gov. Eliot Spitzer a hearty thank-you for his veto of a bill that would have blocked the city from disciplining its own police force. The bill was introduced in the Legislature in response to a Court of Appeals decision last year which held that if cities had laws on the books granting their administrations disciplinary authority, those laws superseded labor contracts with police unions — labor contracts which typically provide for outside arbitration of disciplinary matters. Mayor Brian Stratton, on the advice of the city’s lawyer, claims that Schenectady does have such a law, in the form of its 100-year-old city charter, even though the charter is not explicit on the matter. Whether he’s right will be for another court to decide, assuming that the city’s police union challenges him, but in the meantime he can take comfort from the governor’s support. It is a shame that the bill got as far as the governor’s desk in the first place. It was clearly a “special interest” bill, serving the police unions and no one else, and the Legislature, to its discredit, virtually rubberstamped it. The vote in favor of it was unanimous in the Senate and was 146-4 in the Assembly. All of Schenectady’s representatives at the time — Sen. Hugh Farley and Assemblymen Jim Tedisco and Paul Tonko — voted in favor of it, meaning they voted against the city’s ability to control its own police department. It tells us a great deal about how the Legislature operates. Too bad. The people of Schenectady, like the people of every other town and city, vote for legislators to represent their particular interests at the state level, but in the end it falls to the governor to do the representing. The legislators sell out. Like automatons they vote for whatever their own leadership has already approved at the behest of powerful lobbies like the police unions. Shame on those legislators, and a salute, at least in this case, to the governor.
Hmmmm.....I think there is more to it than that. Spitzer wouldn't buck the PBA's this early in his govenor's career. I'd like to think that it is just that cut and dry, but I question the decision and motives.
And if the state law supersedes county and city laws, than why is it that Bennett is expecting a 'fight' from the SPD's PBA? Or perhaps the existing contract allowing arbitration will have to expire before 'spitzer's veto' takes effect.
When the INSANE are running the ASYLUM In individuals, insanity is rare; but in groups, parties, nations and epochs, it is the rule. -- Friedrich Nietzsche
“How fortunate for those in power that people never think.” Adolph Hitler
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