Fairfax County police
ticket policy scrutinized
By Justin Jouvenal
Drivers
often suspect officers are trying to fill a ticket quota when they get pulled
over, but a memo that went to a Fairfax County police squad laid out in black
and white exactly how many citations it had to issue.
In
case any officers missed the point, supervisors at the Sully District Station
in Chantilly underlined the pertinent section: “Either 2 summonses or 1 summons
and 1 warning must be issued and entered per day on average.”
Fairfax
police officials quickly tossed out the performance standards after The
Washington Post obtained a copy of the memo and began asking questions about
it.
Officials
said the standards violated the department’s standing policy against the
controversial practice of ticket quotas, which are illegal in some states and
many say put pressure on officers to hand out tickets for marginal offenses.
“It
was an innocent mistake, not malicious,” said Lt. Col. Edwin C. Roessler Jr.,
deputy chief of police for patrol. “It was rescinded immediately. That’s not
the way we do business.”
Roessler
said it did not appear that the “minimum standards” outlined in the “Squad
Expectations and Operational Instructions” affected the ticket production of
the squad. He also said that he had not found any officers who had been
disciplined as a result of missing that mark and that if he did, he would
overturn the punishment.
Roessler
also said he was conducting an audit to ensure similar standards were not in
effect elsewhere in the department.
The
memo, issued by 2nd Lt. Tim Burgess and Sgt. David Kuhar on Oct. 1, went to
only about 12 officers on one squad, police said. The county police department
has 48 squads and additional special units at its eight stations.
Nevertheless,
it raised some eyebrows. Fairfax County Supervisor Michael R. Frey (R) said
that traffic is the top issue for his constituents in the Sully District but
that police supervisors missed the mark with the standards.
“If
it’s a mandate, it goes too far,” Frey said. “If it’s an encouragement, it’s
probably poorly worded. I would certainly be more comfortable encouraging
aggressive enforcement rather than having hard and fast numbers.”
In
the memo, the ticket guidelines were included among 20 standards for
performance, including returning calls in the same work cycle they are received,
refraining from sexual or racist jokes, and respecting senior officers.
Most
police departments publicly eschew ticket quotas as a sole measure of an
officer’s performance, saying they do not capture the disparate tasks that go
into good policing. In addition, they are usually not popular among officers or
the public, which bears the brunt of the policy.
Chris
Cochrane, president of the Fairfax Coalition of Police union, declined to
comment on the memo, saying he was unfamiliar with the specifics of the case,
but he added that “as far as the union knows, there is no ticket quota” in the
Fairfax police department.
It’s
not the first time that an area police department’s ticket-writing practices
have been scrutinized. In April, Arlington County’s police chief acknowledged a
series of memos dating back years that required officers to make a minimum
number of arrests and traffic citations.
Chief
M. Douglas Scott said the directives did not constitute a quota system but
could have been interpreted that way.
In
2004, union officials with the Falls Church police revealed that officers were
required to make three arrests and issue three traffic citations during a
12-hour shift. Officers said the policy encouraged them to pursue offenses that
could be written up quickly, such as a broken headlight, instead of more
time-consuming work, such as pulling over a drunk driver. The quotas were later
rescinded.
Some
states ban ticket quotas. In Maryland, law enforcement agencies cannot enact
formal or informal quotas or use such numbers as the sole standard in
evaluating officer’s performance for promotions or demotions. Virginia does not
have such a law.
Chuck
Wexler, executive director of the Police Executive Research Forum, said police
departments face a careful balancing act when it comes to setting goals for
officers’ performance.
“While
quotas are never the right thing to do, there has to be a level of expectation
for officers,” Wexler said.
After
reviewing the memo, Wexler said he thought the Fairfax police supervisors had
struck the right balance with a comprehensive set of standards by which to
measure officers that went beyond just ticket production.
