Latest / Brian Thomas / Ken Kober - The city "finds" 23M in unspent funds

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Ken Kober - The city "finds" 23M in unspent funds · Brian Thomas

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Speaker 1: 628-55KRC, The Talk Station. Happy Wednesday to you. Ah, let
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Speaker 1: us see here. It's time for Ken Kober. FOP President
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Speaker 1: Ken Kober representing the Cincinnati Police Department's union and all
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Speaker 1: the Cincinnati Police Department. God bless each and every one
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Speaker 1: of the officers who wears a uniform in support of
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Speaker 1: public safety in the greater Cincinnati area. What a tough
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Speaker 1: job it's got to be. Welcome back, Ken Kober. Hadn't
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Speaker 1: gotten any easier lately, has it?
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Speaker 2: No, good morning, Brian. It certainly hasn't.
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Speaker 1: Well, let us talk about, you can't, I obviously say
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Speaker 1: this tongue-in-cheek, you can't launch a levy in support of
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Speaker 1: this police department, can you? You got to wait for
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Speaker 1: the city council to allocate funds to you?
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Speaker 3: Yeah, that's correct. All of the funding that we get
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Speaker 3: is straight from city council.
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Speaker 1: All right. And with that in mind, they have $ 23
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Speaker 1: million left over from last year's budget. First of all,
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Speaker 1: I I find it kind of surprising that with all
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Speaker 1: these cries and claims that they don't have enough money
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Speaker 1: in the city coffers, that they couldn't spend the $ 23 million,
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Speaker 1: but apparently it was allocated to some projects which couldn't
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Speaker 1: move forward. But now they seem to be looking for
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Speaker 1: places to spend it. Question, Ken Coburn, I think you
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Speaker 1: already know the answer to this. Any suggestion that some
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Speaker 1: of the money might go to public safety resources?
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Speaker 2: Yeah, that would certainly be appropriate.
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Speaker 3: It is kind of ironic that the timing of this
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Speaker 3: that we just filed– with the State Employment Relations Board
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Speaker 3: our notice to negotiate our next contract for the next
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Speaker 3: three years.
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Speaker 1: Ah, and I presume, you being the head of the union,
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Speaker 1: that you're going to be looking for more money for
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Speaker 1: your beleaguered officers.
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Speaker 2: Oh, without a doubt.
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Speaker 3: I mean, what they had to endure over the last
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Speaker 3: six months between spring and summer, now into fall, certainly
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Speaker 3: warrants a wage increase, especially when you look at what
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Speaker 3: our homicide rate is currently. City leaders are talking about
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Speaker 3: how it's the lowest in 20 years. That's not possible
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Speaker 3: without the Cincinnati Police Department.
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Speaker 1: Well, every homicide that happens and every crime that's committed
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Speaker 1: in downtown Cincinnati requires police resources to find the perpetrators.
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Speaker 1: That investigative work takes up a lot of time. How
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Speaker 1: many open cases or how many unresolved murders are there
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Speaker 1: in the city of Cincinnati, if you have any concept,
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Speaker 1: Ken Kober?
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Speaker 3: I can tell you, as far as homicides go, their
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Speaker 3: clearance rate is absolutely incredible. It is well above the
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Speaker 3: national average. I mean, they're closing 60 to 80 percent
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Speaker 3: of their cases.
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Speaker 1: Wow, that's impressive. Closing, would you say successfully or just,
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Speaker 1: you know, we can't find anybody, the trails run dry,
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Speaker 1: and we're just going to put it in the closed
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Speaker 1: case file. But when you close something, that means you
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Speaker 1: have resolved it? Yeah.
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Speaker 2: There, there is no closed case file.
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Speaker 3: Every homicide that we have, if we don't have suspect,
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Speaker 3: there's no resolution to it. It stays open until they
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Speaker 3: get to the point. I mean, there's, we have cold
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Speaker 3: cases that we've worked on that are 20.
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Speaker 1: 30, 40 years old. I got a good friend, John Newsome,
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Speaker 1: who was a Cincinnati police officer and worked cold cases
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Speaker 1: for Warren County Sheriff's department. What a great, great stories
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Speaker 1: he's got. But yeah, they, I understand. Maybe I should
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Speaker 1: have said cold cases rather than closed cases. But I'm
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Speaker 1: glad to hear the resolution rate is so high. That's
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Speaker 1: sound information. That's a credit to you and the police
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Speaker 1: department doing great work. But in terms of money, I
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Speaker 1: know salary negotiations are always a real problem. But I
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Speaker 1: guess part of the reason you would need a raise
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Speaker 1: is the effort to draw lateral hires. If you're not
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Speaker 1: paying enough to a police officer to take on the
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Speaker 1: challenges of being a Cincinnati police officer, no one's going
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Speaker 1: to want to work for the Cincinnati Police Department.
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Speaker 2: Yeah.
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Speaker 3: I mean, it's, it's an absolute challenge trying to get
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Speaker 3: people in the door, trying to keep people. And then,
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Speaker 3: you know, the latest effort of course, is to have
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Speaker 3: another lateral class, which, you know, the only way that
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Speaker 3: people are going to leave typically their current employer is
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Speaker 3: for more money.
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Speaker 2: And that's just, that's the bottom line.
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Speaker 3: And I know the city three years ago made a commitment,
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Speaker 3: gave us a rather a quality raise.
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Speaker 2: And we hope that that's going to be the same
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Speaker 2: way this time ago.
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Speaker 1: Well, another challenge seems to be the political environment. When,
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Speaker 1: Do you have any interaction with people who are maybe
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Speaker 1: considering even lateral hires? Or have you talked to people
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Speaker 1: who say, I'm never going to consider a lateral hire?
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Speaker 1: I don't care if you increase the salary $ 15, 000, $ 20, 000 annually.
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Speaker 1: I refuse to work for a government that does not
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Speaker 1: embrace law enforcement and support it openly, loudly, and enthusiastically,
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Speaker 1: including the prosecutor's office and the judicial branch. I mean,
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Speaker 1: why do a job if it's pointless, Ken?
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Speaker 2: Sure.
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Speaker 3: I mean, there are some officers from neighboring departments out
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Speaker 3: in the county that, whether it's a township administrator or
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Speaker 3: their local small government, truly supports the police, pays them.
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Speaker 2: Well, and they're like, listen, I'd never leave. I got really,
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Speaker 2: really good here.
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Speaker 3: But on the flip side of that, there are other
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Speaker 3: departments that don't pay as well that officers go, well,
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Speaker 3: we're going to wait and see. If you guys get
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Speaker 3: a sizable enough raise, maybe it'll be worth my time
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Speaker 3: to be able to go somewhere else.
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Speaker 1: Well, insofar as the $ 23 million we'll just say that
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Speaker 1: is open for anybody to put their hand in there,
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Speaker 1: what do you think, in terms of public safety, the
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Speaker 1: police department specifically, or generally speaking, allocations of resources toward
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Speaker 1: public safety, what would Ken Kober or what do you
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Speaker 1: think the police department would most desire if they got
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Speaker 1: a chunk of that money?
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Speaker 3: Well, the one thing would be funding for our wellness unit.
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Speaker 3: they've gotten $ 0. Everything that they've gotten has come from grants.
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Speaker 3: And it's time to fund the wellness unit. We talk
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Speaker 3: about officers that struggle with seeing violence on a daily basis.
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Speaker 3: You know, coworkers that pass away, coworkers that get sick.
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Speaker 3: You know, just seeing the general public and how nasty
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Speaker 3: these officers can be treated takes a toll on officers.
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Speaker 3: So it would be nice to see that the city
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Speaker 3: would invest in our wellness unit and actually have some
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Speaker 3: resources for these officers that are outside what's already being done.
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Speaker 1: Oh, my God. I just had terrible flashbacks of the
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Speaker 1: years my sister was a police officer and the horrors
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Speaker 1: of exactly what you talked about. Talking about post-traumatic stress.
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Speaker 1: It's overwhelming. Ken, let's pause for a moment. I'll bring
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Speaker 1: you back. We're going to dive further into this topic.
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Speaker 1: It's 635 right now. 55 KRC.
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Speaker 2: The Talk Station. It is. It is.
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Speaker 1: 639-55-KRC-D Talk Station. Ryan Thomas with FOP President Ken Kober.
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Speaker 1: We're talking about the $ 23 million leftover money. Newman Golf
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Speaker 1: Course is going to get a new clubhouse. Affordable housing
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Speaker 1: is going to get $ 5 million or $ 3 million. And
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Speaker 1: some other areas that sort of kind of question marks
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Speaker 1: swirling around where this money would go, but not a
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Speaker 1: word in the local media about the $ 23 million going
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Speaker 1: to anything related to public safety. And you stumbled upon
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Speaker 1: a real nerve with me there, Ken Kober, when you
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Speaker 1: talk about the wellness unit. The wellness unit for the
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Speaker 1: police department is designed to provide mental health services for
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Speaker 1: our distressed officers. Is that what I understand? Is that
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Speaker 1: correct understanding, Ken?
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Speaker 3: Yeah, but it's just not mental health services. I mean,
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Speaker 3: they've got different clinicians that can provide like marital counseling
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Speaker 3: if you're having trouble with your child, financial wellness, physical wellness,
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Speaker 3: all of those things.
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Speaker 2: It's not just mental health.
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Speaker 3: It's basically we want you to be a well human
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Speaker 3: being from every aspect in life.
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Speaker 1: But you said there's been no money allocated to this.
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Speaker 1: How long has this wellness unit, regardless of the scope
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Speaker 1: and breadth of the services provided, and I'm glad to
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Speaker 1: hear that it provides a wealth of different services, but
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Speaker 1: how long has it been around and how long has
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Speaker 1: it been unfunded, Ken?
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Speaker 3: Well, the only funding that it's ever gotten has been
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Speaker 3: some federal funding that ran out September 30th. It's been
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Speaker 3: around full-time five to six years, somewhere around there. But
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Speaker 3: understand that The FOP is going to step up and
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Speaker 3: provide some of these things financially, as well as we've
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Speaker 3: partnered with the Blue Line Foundation, which is a nonprofit
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Speaker 3: whose sole purpose is to support law enforcement. So as
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Speaker 3: long as the city doesn't fund these things, we're going
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Speaker 3: to continue to find a way to do it in
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Speaker 3: hopes that someday they'll recognize the true worth of this,
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Speaker 3: and they'll begin to fund it.
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Speaker 1: Well, okay, let me tell you, does this sound familiar?
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Speaker 1: Being spit at, punched, cursed out on a regular basis,
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Speaker 1: seeing the worst elements of humanity on a daily basis,
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Speaker 1: including blood, dead bodies, and child molestations on video and
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Speaker 1: in social media that you've got to try to track
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Speaker 1: down the child molesters, having to deal with and interview
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Speaker 1: people child molesters and work with children who've been the
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Speaker 1: victim of child molestation, since it's in the news now,
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Speaker 1: considering Amy Acton and this ad campaign that was been,
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Speaker 1: it was run. I mean, that can take a toll
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Speaker 1: on an officer. Does that sound like things that officers
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Speaker 1: regularly encounter on a day-to-day basis?
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Speaker 2: Absolutely.
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Speaker 3: You know, some, some of them will experience those things
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Speaker 3: before they're halfway through their shift. And it's something that
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Speaker 3: we have got to find a way to invest in
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Speaker 3: wellness That way we can make sure that these officers
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Speaker 3: that are experiencing some of these things that say, hey, listen,
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Speaker 3: I need to get a little bit of help. I
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Speaker 3: want to make sure that I stay well because what
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Speaker 3: do we know? A healthy police officer is going to
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Speaker 3: be more effective. They're going to get complained on less.
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Speaker 3: They're going to have less use as a force. All
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Speaker 3: of these things that tell us that if we have
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Speaker 3: these officers that are well, it's going to be good
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Speaker 3: for everybody.
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Speaker 1: Clearly. Clearly. But the idea that you've got, you've got
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Speaker 1: to get out of bed going and knowing you're going
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Speaker 1: to encounter the list of horrors. And I'm sure that
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Speaker 1: my list that I came up with on the break
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Speaker 1: was just abbreviated. I'm just trying to recall a lot
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Speaker 1: of the conversations I had with my sister over the years.
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Speaker 1: And damn, it did take a mental toll on her,
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Speaker 1: most notably being in special crimes. But, you know, you've
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Speaker 1: got that to start your day. Now, what else you've
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Speaker 1: got on start your day that the wellness center might
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Speaker 1: deal with? The financial issues you talked about, the relationship
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Speaker 1: issues that you through, all of which are compounding an
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Speaker 1: otherwise preexisting problem with just being a police officer. Of course,
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Speaker 1: these services are worthy. I'm just shocked that the city, well,
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Speaker 1: maybe I'm not shocked, but that the city of Cincinnati
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Speaker 1: has overlooked and refused or hasn't financed this. It's maybe
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Speaker 1: just another illustration of how they do not support the
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Speaker 1: police department, Ken.
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Speaker 3: Well, and this is one of the things which I
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Speaker 3: appreciate that you give me a platform to be able
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Speaker 3: to talk about this. That way, maybe the listeners, you know,
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Speaker 3: maybe there's council members that are listening are going to go,
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Speaker 3: you know what? Maybe we did, uh, overlook this and
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Speaker 3: we're going to do something to make it right. That's
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Speaker 3: my hope that eventually that they're going to say, you
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Speaker 3: know what, we're going to invest in this.
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Speaker 1: Well, you know, hope my grandma had a, uh, maybe
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Speaker 1: FCC noncompliant comment or a phrase with hope, but, um,
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Speaker 1: how about optimism that this might come about the optimism
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Speaker 1: that the city might say, oh, you know what? I
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Speaker 1: heard Ken in the morning show or yeah, I've heard
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Speaker 1: some requests for money for this wellness center. It would
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Speaker 1: do police a lot of good if they had these resources,
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Speaker 1: and okay, so we're going to fund it. Any hope
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Speaker 1: that that's going to actually happen, Ken?
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Speaker 3: Well, you know, we're going to be negotiating a contract.
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Speaker 3: I'm sure this is going to be a topic of discussion,
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Speaker 3: but we are going to find a way, one way
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Speaker 3: or another, to make sure that these officers have the
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Speaker 3: tools that they need, they have clinicians that they need,
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Speaker 3: that way we can get these officers, not only get
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Speaker 3: them well, but keep them well.
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Speaker 1: Well, can I ask you where you feel your negotiation
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Speaker 1: position is with regard to the city of Cincinnati regarding
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Speaker 1: all matters that you're going to be negotiating in the contract,
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Speaker 1: most notably salary? Do you have a hand in this,
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Speaker 1: an upper hand or an even hand? I just wonder
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Speaker 1: what you're coming to the table with because I believe
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Speaker 1: that you deserve some additional resources. Clearly, I agree that
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Speaker 1: I think every police officer deserves a salary increase just
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Speaker 1: for dealing with what they have to deal with every day. But,
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Speaker 1: of course, things like this wellness unit, how can you
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Speaker 1: argue against it? You feel like you're going in with
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Speaker 1: a strong position, Ken, because I sure as hell hope
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Speaker 1: you are.
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Speaker 2: Well, sure.
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Speaker 3: You know, I had some young officers this past week
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Speaker 3: I was talking to, and they're like, so what do
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Speaker 3: you think about this next contract? And I said, well,
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Speaker 3: I don't think the city is in the position to
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Speaker 3: make this job any less attractive.
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Speaker 2: Than it already is.
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Speaker 3: In fact, they need to be doing things to make
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Speaker 3: this more attractive. And part of that is funding. But
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Speaker 3: there's a couple of other things that they need to consider, too,
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Speaker 3: along the way that will make this more of an
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Speaker 3: attractive job.
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Speaker 1: Any specifics on that?
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Speaker 2: Well, I mean, one of them, you.
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Speaker 3: Look at how many officers had off days canceled over
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Speaker 3: the last six months.
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Speaker 2: Hundreds. Well, yeah, they just canceled their off days, and
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Speaker 2: it's always on the weekends. And what do we know?
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Speaker 2: It's shift work.
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Speaker 3: Many officers, their weekends off only come around every so often,
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Speaker 3: and then they're taking those off days. And that's something
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Speaker 3: that has been extremely frustrating. I think if you ask
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Speaker 3: the younger officers... They would say, I would rather have
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Speaker 3: less of a raise and more time off. And, of course,
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Speaker 3: the officers that are getting ready to retire say, I'd
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Speaker 3: rather have the money because it's.
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Speaker 2: Going to help my pension. But there has to be
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Speaker 2: a balance.
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Speaker 1: There has to be. There has to be. And Lord knows,
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Speaker 1: we talk about the parade of horribles it is being
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Speaker 1: a police officer. We just went through the idea of
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Speaker 1: having a day off. That's like you need that. You've
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Speaker 1: got to have some time to recharge the batteries or
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Speaker 1: all these problems are just going to get exacerbated.
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Speaker 3: Yeah, and that's the problem is we're seeing that the
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Speaker 3: officers are getting burnt out and there's something that's going
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Speaker 3: to have to be done and it's going to have
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Speaker 3: to be done quickly. Otherwise, you're going to see more
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Speaker 3: officers that are leaving and you're going to see less
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Speaker 3: officers or less potential candidates wanting to come here knowing that,
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Speaker 3: you know, when my weekends come around, plan on getting
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Speaker 3: your off days canceled because you're going to work anyway.
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Speaker 3: That's just not going to be sustainable for the future.
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Speaker 1: And you're still having officers take the retirement on time
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Speaker 1: or considering early retirement right now, Ken?
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Speaker 3: We have officers leaving weekly, and that's just going to
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Speaker 3: continue because part of it is, as we're getting a
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Speaker 3: younger department, we still have roughly 150, 200 officers that
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Speaker 3: could walk out the door between now and next summer.
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Speaker 3: And they're going to have to find a way to
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Speaker 3: keep those officers if they want to be able to
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Speaker 3: find a way to give them off days.
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Speaker 1: Well, there's a pile of $ 23 million sitting in their hands,
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Speaker 1: and they seem really itchy to spend it. Maybe they
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Speaker 1: need to keep a pile of resources laying around to
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Speaker 1: keep officers on the job, maybe by offering them a
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Speaker 1: bonus or something along those lines. I don't know what
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Speaker 1: the contract negotiates to require collective bargaining, whether the city
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Speaker 1: can just step up and voluntarily give every police officer
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Speaker 1: $ 1, 000 or something like that just to take the edge off.
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Speaker 1: But it sounds like a good idea to me, Ken.
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Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, if they can give a golf course
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Speaker 3: $ 5 million, they can certainly invest in the people that
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Speaker 3: protect the city.
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Speaker 1: Thank you for knocking it out of the park with
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Speaker 1: that one, Ken Kober. Ken, God bless you. Good luck
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Speaker 1: with the negotiations coming up. You have a welcome place
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Speaker 1: here on the 55 KRC Morning Show to advance your cause,
14:39
Speaker 1: your position, and, of course, anything we can do here
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Speaker 1: on the morning show to support the Cincinnati Police Department.
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Speaker 1: I got your back, brethren. So does Joe.
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Speaker 3: Thanks.
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Speaker 2: I appreciate it. Anytime, man.
14:49
Speaker 1: Anytime. And the listening audience. Of course, my listening audience.