The Hoboken Journal: Police to Plan Rally in front of City Hall Tonight at 6PM

Wednesday, September 1, 2010

Police to Plan Rally in front of City Hall Tonight at 6PM

Hoboken Patch (Police Union Urges Mayor To Rethink Lay Offs) is reporting that the PBA will stage a rally in front of City Hall tonight at 6 pm protesting Mayor Dawn Zimmer's Police layoff plan of 18 officers set to be enacted on September 24th.

The Hoboken PBA has a new Tumblr website up that addresses the issue and it has little content to date but does have a petition with about 131 signatures as of 11am.. The signatures have some fake names (like Arch Liston) and quite a few names are duplicated so the number is likely under 100 and appears to be mostly friends and family of Hoboken Policemen from my perusal of some of the names.

Link to PBA Website "Keep Hoboken Safe": http://keephobokensafe.tumblr.com/

Here is the link to the petition: http://keephobokensafe.tumblr.com/petition

It seems as if the petition online has been overrun with a lot of fake names starting with page 3 and sarcasm, Reminiscent of Beth Mason's boondoggle "Dual Job Dawn" petition last year.

Bogus sign-ins on Police Petition protesting layoffs

My Comment: I am curious to see the turnout of this event in relation to prior events such as Hoboken Revolt which had over 300 actual tax paying citizens at its biggest rally. I wonder if the PBA will bus in other policemen to protest in solidarity. Newark and Jersey City had much bigger reductions in force proposed/enacted and I am not sure why Hoboken is garnering so much attention.

Tonight's City council meeting should be interesting. At least there will be police present to escort a certain political operative from chambers should he once again get out of line.

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p1ywood 98p · 762 weeks ago

This rally should be quite an event. And keep in mind that for everyone's safety, please, absolutely no crowd diving.

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InfotainMe · 762 weeks ago

Everything I have done
Up to this point
Up to this point
Everything I have done
Up to this point

Got no devil on my shoulder
Got no angel in my ear
Everything that I have done
Has been the result
Of my own ideas

-Roadside Graves
http://s0.ilike.com/play#The+Roadside+Graves:Ever...

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deleted5542758 83p · 762 weeks ago

That meeting sucked balls last night. It was incredibly difficult to stand there in a sea of yellow and listen to story after story that will break your heart. I feel bad for every single young man/woman who is eager to do his/her job but is being pushed out by the fatcats up top. When some of these guys were talking about family members who are on the force and have been for 40 years, I couldn't help but wonder why those 40 year vets are still there. NYPD doesn't have that problem. What's different here? -- Pensions apparently. NYPD incentivizes their force to retire after 20, Hoboken has been run so badly that the incentive is to stay as long as possible and choke the job out of the youngin's.

In any event, listening to the "They want us fired" being directed at "yuppies" or "new people" over and over was sad. I know that the people losing their jobs believe that. And it's simply not true. I feel for every one of them, but that's not the issue. I am certain that the Mayor doesn't want to lay them off. The incompetent boob who put on the sideshow during the council's session (aka PBA guy Lombardi) is the issue. Just listening to him grandstand and threaten the administration made it clear who the roadblock is. I know the men/women who do the work want to keep their jobs; I heard Chief Falco say he wanted to work to keep them their jobs; and I know the Mayor wants to compromise to keep their jobs. But LOMBARDI doesn't care about keeping jobs - he cares about finger pointing, hand wringing and rebel rousing.

I sincerely hope that Falco can come up with a plan to reduce costs by $1.5mm as he indicated he could and forces Lombardi to take the deal.

***** BTW, has it occurred to anyone that when the police agree that the final number of officers can be cut by 18 through ATTRITION rather than LAYOFFS that that must mean the final number is a safe number of cops?

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khoboken · 762 weeks ago

KS

I got your last point loud and clear last night. What came across the screen was not pretty and at times it was scary that some of the speakers are actually in uniform carrying weapons. Your point about NYC is spot on. There is no reason for the higher ranks that are getting demoted because of the chart reorganization to hang onto their jobs at this point. The anger form the ranks is misguided. Their union sold them out, not the city. Nowhere have I read or understood that the plan calls for 18 uniformed beat cops to be eliminated - it reduces the bloated upper ranks. The union rules and contracts permit bumping down, which has the effect of laying off the most junior officers, but then again, that it what the union wanted.

1 reply · active 762 weeks ago

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deleted8670214 100p · 762 weeks ago

How about we institute a fitness exam. Cops who fail b/c they are overweight go on unpaid suspension for a period of time and if they fail to get in shape they get eventually fired or pushed into retirement. The older cops who have vested pensions and ample midsections will retire b/c they'd rather do that vs. sit at home and collect no paycheck. There, problem solved through attrition. The best part is we get to keep all the younger fit cops capable of doing their jobs w/o having a massive heart attack the first time they need to chase a criminal.

Ohio did this w/ their state troopers so not like it hasn't been tried before.