$825,000 to be used for training, Tasers in wake of Childs' death

By April M. Washington, Rocky Mountain News
May 6, 2004

Denver Mayor John Hickenlooper backed a mandate for increased police training with cold-hard cash Wednesday - four months after calling for major reform of the city's police department.

The city plans to spend $825,000 originally earmarked for new police radios on increased crisis training and 100 additional Taser stun guns for officers.

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Those are just two of a number of reforms under way in the wake of the police shooting last summer of a mentally disabled teenager.

"When the mayor introduced his reforms, he made it clear many of the changes would require additional resources," said Lindy Eichenbaum Lent, spokeswoman for the mayor. "He made it clear it would be challenging in the current fiscal climate, but we're committed to finding resources."

The city's budget crunch forced Police Chief Gerry Whitman and the city's budget office to find a creative way to jump-start the training.

In doing so, city officials decided to tap money set aside for the police radios. The radios will be purchased instead with a portion of a $15 million Homeland Security grant awarded to the metro region last fall.

About $332,000 of the $825,000 will cover overtime pay to keep officers on the streets while 500 police officers are in crisis intervention training over the next two years. The training is for 45 hours over a five-day period.

"We're not lacking good ideas," Whitman said. "A lot of the time, it's just having enough people and money to implement them fast enough."

In December, Hickenlooper called for sweeping police reforms that included increasing police training, equipping cops with less-lethal weapons and examining the department's use-of-force policies, among others.

The reforms carry a price tag of $2 million.

A resolution adopted by the City Council about the same time called for similar changes. The action was prompted by officer James Turney's fatal shooting of Paul Childs, a developmentally disabled teen, who was wielding a knife.

Denver Manager of Safety Al LaCabe recommended last month that Turney be suspended for 10 months without pay for violating department rules and making "tactical errors."

Turney is appealing that decision to the city's Civil Service Commission.

Council members and community activists praised the mayor for finding a way to fund the reform.

"This is consistent with the mayor's reform package and what the council called for in its resolution in December," said Councilman Rick Garcia.

The Rev. Reginald Holmes, president of the Denver Greater Ministerial Alliance, agreed, but remains skeptical.

"The Police Department has often instituted changes only to let them fall by the wayside," he said. "I'm hopeful that there are going to be sincere changes in the department.

"None of us want to go through again what we've gone through in the last 12 months."

Paying for reform

$2 million: Total cost of Denver Police Department reforms.

$825,000: Amount originally earmarked for new radios that will be redirected to the effort.

100: Number of Taser guns that will be added to the department arsenal.

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