City PPV A Family Matter

Should they or shouldn't they?

Should Warsaw police officers be allowed to take their squad cars home?

And if they do, should their families be allowed to ride in the cars with them?

Half of Warsaw's city council doesn't think so.

Warsaw Police Department's current policy for personal patrol vehicles, which began in 1990, allows one vehicle per officer, and the officer may drive his squad car to and from work. Since Aug. 1 the department has had 36 cars in its fleet.

The 1990 policy bans family members from riding in PPVs.

Controversy erupted last summer when WPD Chief Craig Allebach asked Warsaw's city council to expand the program to allow families to ride in PPVs when the officer was off duty. Not only did the council vote not to expand the policy, but a majority of council members approved a motion to reinforce the prohibition on family members while the officer is on- and off-duty.

Most council members see the issue as a two-part question: Do they approve of the PPV program? Do they approve of family members riding in PPVs?

A recent informal poll of the city council found that a majority of the council favors the PPV program, but the council is nearly evenly divided over the family policy.

Three council members - Porter Polston, Mac Silveus and Tammy Rockey - and Mayor Ernie Wiggins approved of family members riding in police cars - with limitations.

Four councilmen - Gene Brumfield, Dewey Lawshe, Jerry Patterson and Paul Siebenmorgen - opposed a policy where families could ride in squad cars at all.

Liability for family members of police officers if something went wrong was the council's initial reason for denying access and continues to be the favored reason of the councilmen who oppose the policy.

"I'm concerned with liability," Siebenmorgen said. "I don't think that this is a risk factor that the taxpayers should be worrying about."

Patterson echoed Siebenmorgen's reasoning. "I don't think family members have any business being in emergency vehicles," he said. "You never know what's going to happen. ... You don't want to put them in harm's way."

Police officers say they're not pressing for using the PPVs as a second family car, but that in certain circumstances, the family restriction is highly impractical.

In a letter to the council, Officer Mike Cox explained the benefit of allowing officers to drop off children at school or day care on the way to work.

"If they cannot transport them in their PPV, it will necessitate delivering them in their personal vehicles, then return home to get their PPV," he said.

Chief Allebach said the family policy affects the main concern of the PPV program, which is to increase the visibility of the police department.

"Our number one concern has always been visibility," he said. "By limiting families off-duty, you have effectively limited the program. The best benefit you have limited the most."

Allebach said the family restriction came about in 1990 because council members at the time were concerned that families would be traumatized by witnessing a serious accident or incident that could happen while they were riding in a squad car.

"They don't give officers credit for having any common sense," he said.

Common sense. It's something police officers must rely on repeatedly, they say, but that the council does not credit them for possessing.

In his Sept. 11 letter to the council, Patrolman Randal Hart said, "... (I)t makes me angry to even think that the Council feels that an officer would even consider placing his family in that position. We are trusted to take care of your family and many more in the community, but we can't be trusted to take care of our own."

The Kosciusko County Sheriff's Department has a PPV program and has allowed families in department cars for years, said Sheriff Al Rovenstine, with no problems.

"We've always felt that that's part of the package," Rovenstine said. "Take-home cars are out there as a deterrent to crime and we've always let the boys let their families ride."

If it's a liability to let families ride, said Allebach, then it's even riskier for other civilians, and he suspended the ride-along program, job shadowing program, the Citizens Academy ride-along, and the internship program.

The concern over liability was not the only reservation expressed by council members. Lawshe pointed out that of the 36 units in the WPD fleet, only eight are used by officers who live within the city limits of Warsaw.

"I don't think the taxpayers should pay for a second unit to transport people at their expense," he said.

Council members also repeatedly asked the same question: If a policeman is in his squad car with his family and witnesses a crime in progress, what does he do with his family if he is the closest car to respond?

If something happened while an officer had family members or a rider in the car, Allebach said, then the officer either would not initiate pursuit or would drop off the riders at a safe place.

"If a cop has a rider, he usually has other officers on the same call," Allebach said.

Rovenstine said there were instances in the past where family members had been dropped off at restaurants when the officers answered a call.

"If an officer involved his family (in an emergency situation), I would question his common sense in general," Allebach said. "You give them a gun and you give them bullets and you don't credit them with enough common sense not to put their family at risk?"

The issue has not come up for debate at a council meeting since the July decision, and Cox's and Hart's letters to the council were acknowledged in September but not discussed.