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“TRIBUTE TO NATION'S LAW ENFORCEMENT OFFICERS AND REQUEST FOR SUPPORT OF 21ST CENTURY POLICING INITIATIVE” mentioning the U.S. Dept. of Justice was published in the House of Representatives section on pages H485-H486 on Feb. 9, 1999.
The publication is reproduced in full below:
TRIBUTE TO NATION'S LAW ENFORCEMENT OFFICERS AND REQUEST FOR SUPPORT OF
21ST CENTURY POLICING INITIATIVE
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of January 19, 1999, the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Sanchez) is recognized during morning hour debates for 5 minutes.
Ms. SANCHEZ. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to pay tribute to our Nation's law enforcement officers; to thank them for risking their lives every single day to keep my family and my community safe.
I have had the fortunate experience of meeting many of my local officers, because they are spending more and more time in our neighborhoods, and it is through the success of Community Oriented Policing that we have helped thousands of local police departments getting their cops out on the beat and away from their desks.
The COPS program has hired, redeployed and retained over 100,000 more police officers who are now more recognized and are active members of their community. But more than that, Community Oriented Policing has proven its effectiveness in the fighting of crime. For example, in my district there is one agency that has seen crime rates drop 58 percent just over the last 5 years. That is more than half of the crime dropping.
Now that the COPS program has reached its goal of placing 100,000 more cops on the beat, it is time to take the next step in crime fighting, and that is through using the most advanced technology to make our police more effective, more efficient and more responsive.
I know a lot of Americans probably watch all of these police officer programs on television and they see all these high-tech types of things going on, computer databasing, et cetera, in which they are able to get the bad guy because of this. But the reality is much different in what is happening across the Nation.
For example, I was in the other day with one of my police departments where they told me it takes them almost a year to check fingerprints because they have no forensic lab right in their own police department. They sent off a pair of fingerprints that used to take 6 to 12 minutes to check, and they called back and were told it would take about a year before they could get the results back. They said, well, this is a very important case. And the woman on the other line said, well, if it is a very important case, we could probably make it faster. He said, well, how about the homicide of a policeman; is that important enough? And she said oh, yes, I think we can do that in two months. Meanwhile, the bad guys keep going on and doing the bad things.
The President has proposed $1.3 billion for the new 21st Century Policing Initiative. Part of that initiative includes giving law enforcement access to the latest crime fighting technologies. This past week I had three or four departments come in and show me some of the prototypes that they have for working with computers with analysis. One of my local police departments, Santa Ana Police Department, is eagerly awaiting to see such a Justice Department program come to fruition. Santa Ana PD has already developed plans for a crime analysis unit which would map and analyze crime patterns. The work of the unit would survey crime trends and patterns to more efficiently allocate police resources and to more quickly apprehend career criminals and predict crime problems.
In the 21st century our greatest tool to fight crime is information. When departments have detailed data on crime statistics or arrest reports they can then achieve a better understanding of each city's crime problems and how to best respond. More importantly, crime analysis contributes to the COPS' philosophy by reducing administration and investigation work for our police officers.
With Santa Ana PD's excellence in community policing, and their foresight in developing a modern advanced technology to fight crime, they can develop a crime analysis unit that departments across the country can use as a model.
Let's work together to make the next step in law enforcement work. I urge my colleagues to support the 21st Century Policing Initiative and to support funding programs like the Santa Ana crime analysis unit.
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