Breaking Rank
Page 31
Reporter
Mr. Commissioner, can you tell our viewers: What exactly is your strategy for dealing with crime and . . .
The mayor interrupts. The camera swings back to him.
Giuliani
Well, as I’ve explained, our strategy for dealing with crime is to tolerate no violations of the law. Tolerance of lawlessness, no matter how seemingly trivial, subtracts from our quality of life. It makes our streets fearsome and foreboding. We’re going to drastically improve the quality of life of every law-abiding New Yorker by refusing to tolerate what you see here tonight. The prostitution, the illegal gambling, the urinating in public, the . . .
The reporter interrupts the mayor. The camera switches over to the commissioner.
Reporter
And, Mr. Commissioner, how do you propose to . . .
The mayor interrupts. The camera switches back to the mayor.
Giuliani
Did I mention zero tolerance? No law too small, no offense too petty. We’re going to enforce all infractions. And I’ve got just the commissioner to do it. Best damn police commissioner in the country. Anyway, that’s my crime plan. Right, Commissioner?
The mayor puts his arm around Bratton, pulls him into the picture. Bratton addresses Giuliani, the camera has them both in the picture for a moment then focuses on Bratton.
Bratton
That’s right, your honor. “Broken windows.” Take care of the small stuff, repair those broken windows, get those abandoned beaters off the road, pinch the misdemeanants, give the physical reality of the city a safe feeling. If the streets look safe and feel safe, New Yorkers will . . .
Giuliani, obviously agitated, interrupts. The camera swings back to him.
Giuliani
See why I picked Mr. Bratton, here? He’s a thinker, a doer. What’d we have before I was elected, Commissioner? Twenty-five hundred, 3,000 killings a year? In a single year?
Camera switches rapidly from mayor to commissioner.
Bratton
Two thousand two hundred and ninety, your honor. In 1990.
Camera back on the mayor.
Giuliani
Speaking directly into the camera.
See what I mean? Unacceptable. Totally unacceptable. You watch. We’re going to cut the murder rate in half. Better than that, actually. Mark my words. We’re taking this city back! Now, if you’ll excuse us. The commissioner and I have some crime-busting business to discuss. Did I mention he’s the best police commissioner this city has ever seen? First-rate. Doing a terrific job with my crime plan. Thanks for your time, Julie. Good to see you out here.
The TV reporter thanks the mayor and the commissioner, says a few words to the folks back in the studio. Lights and camera are cut. Reporter and cameraman head back to their truck. Giuliani and Bratton stroll down the block to a deserted ALCOVE.
Giuliani
Okay, Bratton. What the fuck was that all about?
The commissioner squints, shakes his head, obviously puzzled.
Bratton
What do you mean?
Giuliani
You know goddamn well what I mean. What the hell are you calling the press for?
Bratton
I didn’t call any . . . Didn’t she just say they were in the neighborhood?
Giuliani
Look. Let’s get one thing straight. I’m the capo here. This is my city. No one elected you anything. Got that? You work for me. Capiche?
Bratton
Of course, your honor . . .
INT. MAYOR’S OFFICE—DAY
Sitting behind a massive DESK, U.S. and STATE OF NEW YORK FLAGS behind him, the mayor gets up, walks around the desk, shakes hands with his police commissioner who’s just walked into the office, his trench coat draped over his left arm.
Giuliani
Bill, Bill, Bill. Good to see you. I just wanted to remind you why I selected you. You listen, and you take directions well. I like that. I like what you’re doing with that Comstat thing, putting my program for precinct accountability into action. And hiring that guy, what’s his name? The crazy guy with the crazy shoes. And that crazy hat. What kind of a hat is that, anyway?
Bratton
A homburg, I think.
Giuliani
Right, right. A homburg. What’s the guy’s name?
Bratton
Maple. Jack Maple.
Giuliani
Like the syrup?
Bratton
Like the syrup.
Giuliani
Well, he’s a colorful one, he is. Seems to know his stuff, though. I’ll give him that.
The mayor pauses, shakes his head, continues.
I don’t know . . . Maybe he’s a little too, what, too colorful? If you catch my drift.
Bratton
Your drift?
Giuliani
Publicity, Commish, publicity. The press. Your man Maple seems to need a lot of ink. A lot of ink, indeed. I’m beginning to think maybe he’s even taking a little credit that might belong to certain others. If you catch my drift.
Bratton
But, he . . .
INT. MAYOR’S OFFICE—DAY
Nine months later. The press, academics, and voters have noticed a positive change in the environment around Times Square. The mayor sits behind his DESK, does not get up. The police commissioner walks into the mayor’s office, GLOVES in hand. Starts to remove his COAT. Giuliani waves him off.
No. No need to sit down. I’ll cut to the chase: You, my friend, are skating on thin ice. You know damn well that what’s happening in this city, this, this . . . transformation, is my doing. Not yours, not your syrupy friend, not your academic “broken windows” pals. This is mine. My strategy. My tactics. My police department. My success! You got that?
Bratton
But, sir, I . . . My commanders, and the men and women of the . . .
Giuliani
I said, you got that? Good. Then let’s act accordingly, goddammit. And, what’s this shit about you holding press conferences and entertaining reporters in your office? What’s with these late-night sessions at Elaine’s, for chrissakes! What’s that about?
Bratton
I don’t have a big press office, like . . .
Giuliani
Hey, don’t get smart-mouthed with me! I hear you’re even planning a freaking “police parade” up Broadway? Right? On your freaking birthday! Is a pattern starting to emerge here for you? Or are you just a clueless fuck?
Bratton
I hear what you’re . . .
Eighteen months later. Crime is down, dramatically. The streets are clean. Visitors are flocking back to New York. Giuliani has claimed credit for it. He’s appeared on TV, on “Saturday Night Live” (in drag). He’s become a celebrity. Bratton’s had his share of publicity too. He’s not been on SNL, he’s not pulled the plug on artists’ works, nor carried on a highly public affair with a woman not his wife. But he has energized his department, and he’s talked about the success of NYPD’s crime-fighting efforts. He tells the nation’s chiefs that the police can cut crime, even as he cautions them to be ready for an increase in citizen complaints about “overly aggressive practices.” Tensions have been escalating steadily between the mayor and the commissioner. Then Bratton appears on the cover of Time magazine. The article attributes New York’s turnaround to the new commissioner. Giuliani summons him.
INT. MAYOR’S OFFICE—DAY
Bratton walks in to find Giuliani behind his desk, his jaw set, his eyes reduced to a reptilian slit.
Giuliani
Shut the door, asshole.
Bratton
Who you calling an asshole?
Giuliani
There’s only two of us in this office.
Bratton
That doesn’t clear up a thing.
Giuliani
Nice article in Time.
Bratton
Why, thank you, your honor. I was a little worried that you’d . . .
Get out. You’re fired.
FADE TO BLACK
THE END
Okay, so it’s make-believe. But it can’t be too far from the way it really happened. Much has been written about the relationship between New York City’s former mayor and his police commissioner of 1994–96: Giuliani and Bratton’s celebrated “he said/he said” battles, their struggle for media supremacy, their competing claims to the credit for the remarkable turnaround in the city’s fortunes. Each man has written a book, each crowing about his success in office. I had drinks with Bratton toward the end of his all-too-brief tenure at a hotel bar in Albuquerque. We were attending the Major Cities Police Chiefs conference. I sensed that he believed the end was near, that neither he nor Giuliani was going to budge. Which meant the victory would by default go to the mayor. I was sad about that. I admired the “Commish,” still do. He’s cocky and brash, and he can be flippant at times. But he’s the real deal, and he knows how to make cities safer.
Bill Bratton had established a fine reputation as chief of Boston PD, and later as head of the New York City Transit Police, where he got rid of that all-too-familiar signature of New York, subway graffiti. (The New York City Transit Police Department was consolidated with the New York City Police Department to become a new Bureau within the NYPD on April 2, 1995.) Still, Bratton lasted a mere twenty-seven months before Giuliani sacked him. You have to wonder what more could have been accomplished were it not for the clash of those two publicity-thirsty, power-hungry egos. Bratton was, by all accounts, doing a hell of a job.
It wasn’t on his watch that Louima, Diallo, and Dorismond were tortured or killed by cops of the NYPD. Nor was it on his watch that NYPD’s finest, scores of them, stood by and watched several women being assaulted in Central Park during the Puerto Rican Day parade in 2000.*
It was on Bratton’s watch that NYPD cops got naked in the lobby of a Washington, D.C., hotel.
I was in what we in the Pacific Northwest call the “other Washington” for the annual police memorial service. One of my young officers, Antonio Terry, had been shot and killed in the line of duty. Most of the Terry family was also there, including his wife, Cheryl. A nurses’ convention was being held in our hotel at the same time. When drunken, bare-ass naked NYPD (and other) cops weren’t harassing the nurses, they were straddling the rails of the escalator and riding it up and down, pouring beer all over themselves, whooping and hollering into the night.
When finally someone got the drunks tucked in to bed, the rest of us hotel guests, many drained from a cross-country trip and the emotions of the occasion, settled in for a little shut-eye before the morning’s service on the Mall.
In the middle of the night we were awakened and forced to parade out to the sidewalk in jammies and robes as the hotel’s fire alarms shrieked—and the corridors filled with the acrid contents of fire extinguishers. Just another little prank by members of the biggest police department in the country.
The next day some of those same cops sat in the open trunks of antique police vehicles, firing rounds into the air as they raced about the streets of our nation’s capital. Its humor was lost on Cheryl Terry and her family, including her young fatherless boys, Austin and Colton.
True to his nature, Bratton kicked major butt when his cops got back home to New York. He disciplined seven officers, firing two of them for the debauchery (including one known to his buddies as “Naked Man”).
More than most, Commissioner Bratton was willing to stick his face into the delinquent corners of the police culture, and capture the attention of both crooked and twisted cops. His strong commitment to integrity, and to corruption-free police practices, was much in evidence throughout his tenure. When he stormed the “Dirty Thirty,” rounded up and arrested those corrupt cops, and melted down their tainted badges, honest police officers everywhere celebrated.
Bratton also addressed long-standing institutional problems of vague, unfixed responsibility and authority for crime fighting and problem solving. He put the onus squarely where it belongs, on precinct commanders and field supervisors. We police administrators like to think that we’d been holding our subordinates accountable for results long before Bratton came along. But we were bullshitting the public, and ourselves.
As police commissioner, Bratton put into practice a computerized mapping and statistics system that had been developed by his deputy and chief strategist Jack Maple, he of the homburg, when Maple and Bratton had worked on the Transit police force. “Comstat,” also referred to by many as Compstat, was a rigorous, precedent-setting internal accountability program, with an improbably unimaginative label (it stands for “computer statistics”). Modeled after successful business practices in which individual departments and managers are held accountable for meeting specific performance standards, Comstat put precinct commanders under the gun, continuously, for results in the struggle to reclaim New York City.
Each week, commanders were called to a meeting at the command center to present and defend their crime-fighting strategies—and outcomes—in front of the brass. They were required to describe in concrete terms the statistical picture of crime in their precinct—and what they were doing about it. Behind them, on a huge screen, were arrayed the relevant numbers: crimes by type, time, place, frequency. And in front of them? Deputy Chief Jack Maple, grilling each commander mercilessly, questioning everything. Had the commanders reached their crime reduction targets? If not, why not? And what did they intend to do about it? The precinct commanders were not judged solely on their numbers of arrests or citations, but on their outcomes. Was the quality of life, as measured by crime and disorder, improving week by week, month by month?
Like hundreds of other chiefs from around the world, I sent representatives from SPD to New York to check it out. My people came back with glowing reports, and urged adoption of the Comstat model. We considered possible pitfalls: Comstat’s potential to induce an unhealthy competition between and among precincts, fudging facts to generate additional resources, crime reduction “by eraser” (i.e, intentional underreporting). But even though there had occasionally been such problems in New York, they were immediately addressed. Some commanders quit under the pressure, some were shown the door.
We decided to create our own version of Comstat, which we tagged “SeattleWatch.” Because of our size (four precincts versus New York’s thirty-four), we held monthly instead of weekly meetings. And, because this was Seattle, after all, with its penchant for process and inclusion and honoring all points of view, ours was no doubt a kinder, gentler interrogation of precinct commanders. But the principle was the same: Devolve authority and responsibility to their rightful locus—geographically based, neighborhood-anchored precinct commanders, and hold those commanders accountable for getting the job done.
Bill Bratton did all that in New York, not Rudolph Giuliani.
Bratton is now chief of LAPD, attempting to work a little Big Apple magic in the City of Angels. He’s inherited a once-proud, badly understaffed, scandal-ridden, demoralized agency in a city plagued by increases in violent crime, particularly gang murders. If anyone can turn it around in L.A. it’s Bill Bratton. But his experience in the East, being fired after only two years on the job, raises questions about mayoral–police chief politics—and the ability of city government to launch and sustain an effective, comprehensive crime-fighting strategy. Particularly one that builds improved relations with the community and fosters respect for civil liberties.
Tension between elected mayors and the chiefs they appoint are all but inevitable. Why? Philosophical differences, power struggles, “personality” conflicts. But there are ways to work around these tensions.
When Norm Rice, Seattle’s first African-American mayor, went looking for a new police chief he conducted a national search. Having recently lost out on the chief’s job in San Diego, I mailed off my resume. It survived a “paper screen” that yielded eight candidates. Each of us was then interviewed by a twenty
-three-member citizen panel. Next, I was grilled by the deputy mayor and other staff members. Then I was shrunk by an L.A. shrink, and backgrounded by mayoral staffers and police investigators (along with two junketeering city council members who, once the mayor had picked me, traveled to San Diego for their own investigation).
All of that time and effort would have been for naught if the mayor and I hadn’t agreed on how to police the city of Seattle. Or if we had disagreed on our respective roles (i.e., the decision-making jurisdiction of the mayor vis-à-vis that of the police chief). Or if we couldn’t stand each other.
I’d met with Rice several times during the selection process, but the most consequential of those meetings took place one brisk, sparkling evening in October 1993. We were on the seventy-sixth floor of the Columbia Tower in a private dining room that overlooked downtown and a huge expanse of Elliott Bay and the Puget Sound. By then, I’d fallen in love with the city. I thought I would just about die if I didn’t get the job.
Norm Rice, a gregarious former TV reporter who could make his voice sound like he was talking under water, and who (privately) performed viciously accurate imitations of city council members, also had a serious love affair going with the city.
Like Giuliani, he craved safe, clean streets. But unlike Republican Giuliani, Rice, a lifelong Democrat, fiscal conservative and social progressive, insisted on responsible police practices to achieve those safe, clean streets. He was for gun control, against the war on drugs (or at least its excesses). He was for social justice, against racism, sexism, homophobia. He was the city’s nominal and substantive leader in the creation of healthy communities, leading campaigns for libraries and literacy, low-income housing, parks, services for children, the elderly, and the homeless and other downtrodden members of society. Yet he was worshipped by the business community for his support of initiatives designed to ensure downtown redevelopment and economic vitality throughout the region.
You don’t see mayors like this in San Diego, I thought. I really want to work for this guy. And with him. And move to Seattle.
Over halibut and chardonnay, Rice laid out his expectations for the person who would become his next chief, something he’d already done with the other finalists. “I want a chief who will take the initiative, solve problems, and get the job done,” he said. “Without needing to have his hand held.” I liked the sound of that. “But I also want a chief who understands who’s boss.”