LAT Poll: South Pasadena police add armor to their fleet [View all]

[ellisonz]

January 31, 2012 | 11:39 am
-- Jon Healey

As a South Pasadena resident, I have few complaints about my city's police. I wish they issued more speeding tickets on my street, but that's a minor gripe. Nevertheless, the news that the 35-officer South Pas P.D. has acquired an armored vehicle for the sake of conducting SWAT operations is more than a little unnerving.

A diverse and neighborly middle-class bedroom community, South Pasadena (2010 population: 25,619) has relied on the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department to handle its infrequent need for "tactical operations." By infrequent, I mean not having summoned the sheriff's SWAT team for more than six years. But Police Chief Joe Payne told The Times' Adolfo Flores that local cops are having to depend increasingly on their own personnel to handle SWAT situations, rather than counting on sheriff's deputies.

Then there's the issue of who pays if something should go horribly wrong. "If the Sheriff's Department takes over, they also assume command of operations, which can be problematic because we're still responsible and liable," Payne told Flores.

That's why the South Pasadena Police Department has sent four of its officers to SWAT training, with four more due to receive it soon. These officers will join counterparts from Arcadia, Monrovia and San Marino in the San Gabriel Valley Foothills Special Enforcement Team.

http://opinion.latimes.com/opinionla/2012/01/south-pasadena-police-swat-team-armored-vehicle.html

There is a poll at the bottom of the page.