Police Quotas

[Kraenen]

When you're not busy working (i.e. contributing to the economy) and beating a bad ticket that's a double-whammy to the state.

Of course, depending on salary you might still get paid.

i don't know if you knew this but... you are the state...

[Crissi]

i don't know if you knew this but... you are the state...

Quick, someone post that Matrix meme!

[alturic]

I never understood the whole quota thing, I mean on one hand, I understand WHY it's there obviously tickets are a great way to bring in revenue, but on the other hand, if you can't find people breaking the law...

It's as good as when I worked for Dish and DirecTV... we had quotas for hooking up phone lines, installs per day, and a ton of other things we directly had zero control over. How can you put a quota on someone for something they have no direct control over... in my example... I have zero control over you having land-line phone service... I have zero control over you rescheduling, cancelling because what you were quoted was wrong, a death in your family/reschedule, etc.

I guess there must really be that many criminals out there to where a quota system "works" but god damn.

[Garnier Fructis]

I guess there must really be that many criminals out there to where a quota system "works" but god damn.

Well the majority of people on the highways I drive on go over the speed limit, so it wouldn't be hard to meet a ticket quota at all.

[alturic]

Well the majority of people on the highways I drive on go over the speed limit, so it wouldn't be hard to meet a ticket quota at all.

Oh, the same here, I'm not saying it's hard to meet a quota for tickets, I'm saying it's... I don't know what the word I want to use is... for lack of a better word coming to mind, it's almost like a conflict of interest. It's basically saying police are hired by cities/states as the tax man, a person who generates easy revenue... whatever you want to call it.

[Crissi]

Oh, the same here, I'm not saying it's hard to meet a quota for tickets, I'm saying it's... I don't know what the word I want to use is... for lack of a better word coming to mind, it's almost like a conflict of interest. It's basically saying police are hired by cities/states as the tax man, a person who generates easy revenue... whatever you want to call it.

Its so the city can say "We arnt going to increase taxes!" while finding a way to keep the police force funded.

[Citizen T]

While it's illegal to set a quota, a police officer that can't make 100 contacts per month just isn't doing their job, unless they're in some tiny small town. That's pulling over less than 5 people per day, assuming a 22 day work month.

Quick facts and calculations. According to the FBI (link) on average there are 2.3 police officers per 1000 citizens in a city. This means with 100 contacts per month which would be 1200 contacts per year times 2.3 officers is 2760 stops per 1000 people. By this quota even if half of those stops were people transiting through the city, it would mean that every citizen on average should be stopped about once every 9 months.

And this isn't even counting county police officers which exist at the even higher average rate of 2.7 officers per 1000 citizens and then there are state officers.

This starts to sound like harassment to me.