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Sheriff's plan to urge people to report suspicious behavior unleashes storm of criticism
By Ben Wolford, Sun Sentinel 9:07 p.m. EDT, May 16, 2013
A program in Palm Beach County intended to encourage residents to report suspicious behavior is attracting resistance from around the state.
Under the proposed "Violence Prevention Program," anyone who sees a potentially dangerous situation — a schizophrenic person with weapons, a war veteran making threats to passersby — could call a 24-hour hotline. Legitimate-sounding calls would trigger a visit by specially trained deputies in plain clothes or by mental health professionals.
The Palm Beach County Sheriff says a violence prevention unit could thwart would-be killers like the recent mass shooters in Connecticut and Colorado. The program will cost $3.2 million in the first year. The Florida Legislature agreed to pay $1 million of it.
Despite Sheriff Ric Bradshaw's ostensibly good-willed intent, the plan has been compared to Big Brother, the KGB, Castro's Cuba and Nazi Germany.
Conservative bloggers around the country are condemning this as a First Amendment violation. They say the government of Palm Beach County is trying to encourage residents to tell on their neighbors for anti-government speech. Email messages have spilled into Gov. Rick Scott's inbox, where hundreds of Florida residents urged him to line-item veto the state funding for the program.
Florida TaxWatch, a taxpayer watchdog, on Thursday blackballed a portion of the state's $1 million commitment because it was added at the last minute.
If Scott decides to veto the earmark, in effect denying a statewide contribution to a local project, the county will still go ahead with the plan, a sheriff's office spokeswoman said.
"There's been a lot of misinformation about this whole program," said Nick Iarossi, a lobbyist for the sheriff's office, which serves a million people and responded to 2,224 mental health related calls last year.
Iarossi said all the vitriol stems from a quote from Bradshaw in The Palm Beach Post that he says has been widely misinterpreted. In the article, Bradshaw said, "We want people to call us if the guy down the street says he hates the government, hates the mayor and he's gonna shoot him. What does it hurt to have somebody knock on a door and ask, 'Hey, is everything OK?'"
From that, Iarossi said, "this has been spun into a government issue." Bradshaw has raced to mitigate the backlash.
In documents submitted to the governor, Bradshaw's office describes four samples of how the program would work, giving examples of when the crime prevention unit would respond and when it wouldn't. It would take action when there are direct threats or when, for example, a person is concerned their schizophrenic relative has access to weapons.
But here, the sheriff is clear: If your neighbor has "an arsenal of weapons and has made anti-governmental comments but has not made threats," this person would be left alone.
Hundreds of people, especially those on the political right, say they aren't convinced.
"This proposed policy is reminiscent of the police state in George Orwell's 1984," one local resident, Milton Smith, wrote in an email to Scott. "Palm Beach County should not be allowed to turn into 1939 Nazi Germany."
Dmitry Levin, of Boca Raton, grew up in the Soviet Union, where he said the government encouraged neighbors to "snitch on everybody."
"It's a specific telephone line to report your neighbor who doesn't like the government," Levin said. "When I read that, my jaw dropped. That's KGB in its finest form. The next step would be, what, bonuses for reporting?"
There will be no cash rewards for calling, a sheriff's office spokeswoman confirmed.
They also point out that the investment in this program could save money down the road by preventing the health, security and litigation expenses that come from mass shootings.
"Ultimately," the sheriff's office wrote, "the savings related to preventing one mass shooting can save the taxpayers millions of dollars in addition to anguish and emotional cost of a human life … as well as the public fear."
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/pal...,5606235.story
By Ben Wolford, Sun Sentinel 9:07 p.m. EDT, May 16, 2013
A program in Palm Beach County intended to encourage residents to report suspicious behavior is attracting resistance from around the state.
Under the proposed "Violence Prevention Program," anyone who sees a potentially dangerous situation — a schizophrenic person with weapons, a war veteran making threats to passersby — could call a 24-hour hotline. Legitimate-sounding calls would trigger a visit by specially trained deputies in plain clothes or by mental health professionals.
The Palm Beach County Sheriff says a violence prevention unit could thwart would-be killers like the recent mass shooters in Connecticut and Colorado. The program will cost $3.2 million in the first year. The Florida Legislature agreed to pay $1 million of it.
Despite Sheriff Ric Bradshaw's ostensibly good-willed intent, the plan has been compared to Big Brother, the KGB, Castro's Cuba and Nazi Germany.
Conservative bloggers around the country are condemning this as a First Amendment violation. They say the government of Palm Beach County is trying to encourage residents to tell on their neighbors for anti-government speech. Email messages have spilled into Gov. Rick Scott's inbox, where hundreds of Florida residents urged him to line-item veto the state funding for the program.
Florida TaxWatch, a taxpayer watchdog, on Thursday blackballed a portion of the state's $1 million commitment because it was added at the last minute.
If Scott decides to veto the earmark, in effect denying a statewide contribution to a local project, the county will still go ahead with the plan, a sheriff's office spokeswoman said.
"There's been a lot of misinformation about this whole program," said Nick Iarossi, a lobbyist for the sheriff's office, which serves a million people and responded to 2,224 mental health related calls last year.
Iarossi said all the vitriol stems from a quote from Bradshaw in The Palm Beach Post that he says has been widely misinterpreted. In the article, Bradshaw said, "We want people to call us if the guy down the street says he hates the government, hates the mayor and he's gonna shoot him. What does it hurt to have somebody knock on a door and ask, 'Hey, is everything OK?'"
From that, Iarossi said, "this has been spun into a government issue." Bradshaw has raced to mitigate the backlash.
In documents submitted to the governor, Bradshaw's office describes four samples of how the program would work, giving examples of when the crime prevention unit would respond and when it wouldn't. It would take action when there are direct threats or when, for example, a person is concerned their schizophrenic relative has access to weapons.
But here, the sheriff is clear: If your neighbor has "an arsenal of weapons and has made anti-governmental comments but has not made threats," this person would be left alone.
Hundreds of people, especially those on the political right, say they aren't convinced.
"This proposed policy is reminiscent of the police state in George Orwell's 1984," one local resident, Milton Smith, wrote in an email to Scott. "Palm Beach County should not be allowed to turn into 1939 Nazi Germany."
Dmitry Levin, of Boca Raton, grew up in the Soviet Union, where he said the government encouraged neighbors to "snitch on everybody."
"It's a specific telephone line to report your neighbor who doesn't like the government," Levin said. "When I read that, my jaw dropped. That's KGB in its finest form. The next step would be, what, bonuses for reporting?"
There will be no cash rewards for calling, a sheriff's office spokeswoman confirmed.
They also point out that the investment in this program could save money down the road by preventing the health, security and litigation expenses that come from mass shootings.
"Ultimately," the sheriff's office wrote, "the savings related to preventing one mass shooting can save the taxpayers millions of dollars in addition to anguish and emotional cost of a human life … as well as the public fear."
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/pal...,5606235.story
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