A Final Report on the Organizational Scan of the Cheshire Police Department
March, 2010
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Submitted by and reply to:
Public Safety Services
ICMA Consulting Services
International City/County Management Association
777 North Capitol Street NE, Suite 500
Washington, DC 20002
ConsultingServices@icma.org
202-962-3585
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Leaders at the Core of Better Communities
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A.
leMA Background
International City/County Management Association (ICMA)
The International City/County Management Association (ICMA) is the premier local government leadership and management organization. Since 1914, ICMA's mission has been to create excellence in local governance by developing and fastering professional local government management worldwide. Toward this end, ICMA provides an information clearinghouse, technical assistance, and training and professional development to more than 9,100 chief appointed administrators, assistant administrators, and other individuals throughout the world. The organization's resources and services reach thousands of local, state, and federal government personnel. academics, private sector professionals, citizens, and other individuals with an interest in effective management at the local government level. ICMA's members represent the administrative center of professional municipal. county, and regional services that affect millions of urban and rural citizens on a daily basis and are responsible for the leadership that ensures strategic economic growth and management of public services and infrastructure planning, investment, and development. Every day, local government managers determine policy, programming, funding, and strategic decisions that impact the ability of local resources to deal with situations of all kinds, including the management and operations of public safety and legal departments. Local government managers serve as the "hub of the wheeL" coordinating efforts and implementing strategies for maximum effectiveness and efficiency.
leMA Consulting Services The ICMA Consulting Services team helps communities solve critical problems by providing management consulting support to local governments. One of ICMA Consulting Services' expertise is public safety services, which encompasses the following areas and beyond: organizational development, leadership and ethics, training, assessments of calls for service workload. staffing requirements analysis. designing standards and hiring guidelines for police and fire chief recruitment. police/fire consolidation. community oriented policing, and city/county/regional mergers. The ICMA Public Safety Services team is led by Leonard Matarese, director of public safety services, ICMA Consulting Services. Leonard, along with a team of highly experienced, selected consultants support a number of public safety services projects for jurisdictions nationwide.
Qualifications Among ICMA's many activities, it assists local governments through a variety of programs that focus on specific local government concerns including public safety and fire and police protection.ICMA's focus is on the management perspective in organizing and operating these areas. For this purpose, ICMA Consulting Servjces acts as an objective and trusted broker tapping into the knowledge of the association's membership base and combining expertise from other appropriate experts to offer innovative ideas. lessons learned. and leading practices to communities facing similar challenges. The program provides practical advice and resources that local government managers and staff路 need to improve services and service delivery in their communities.
Final Report - Organizational Scan Town of Cheshire Police Department
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B.
Introduction
ICMA was retained by the Town of Cheshire to conduct an organizational scan of the Cheshire Police Department. This action by the Town was the result of an ongoing series of reported conflicts between the Chief of Police and members of the agency, culminating in the "no confidence" vote of the police union. On January 8,2010, ICMA provided two (2) consultants who conducted a one-day on-site organizational scan of the Cheshire, Ct. Police Department [the "Department"). As a result of this process, which included document review, numerous structured interviews with members of the Department (in various ranks) and other members of Town government, ICMA has concluded that the Department presently suffers from a variety of systemic dysfunctions that severely restrict the Department's ability to engage in effective intra-organizational communications and to fully engage its resources. We wish to emphasize that the problems within this agency are significant, deeply seated and are affecting members of the department at all ranks and at all lengths of tenure. These problems have persisted despite aggressive efforts by the Town Manager and Human Resources Director to resolve them, using commonly accepted, good management and conflict resolution practices. Indeed, the fact that these professionals worked diligently over a period of one year to bring resolution to the problems, without success, demonstrates how challenging the issues are. We believe that these issues are broad based and have festered for some time, . further exacerbating the situation, largely due to the intractability of parties at various ranks throughout the Department. There often exists within law enforcement agencies a specific culture that resists improvement efforts by persons outside the agency. Municipal managers who do not have public safety experience oftentimes do not understand this culture and communications between managers and police chiefs are often difficult - we routinely see this in many communities in which we work.
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Observations These issues are having an extremely serious affect on morale and, consequently, productivity. We heard from long time members of the department that they "dread going to work" and that they were planning on moving up their retirement dates. In some instances officers indicated that they were working at a level that meets requirements but doing nothing more. We are particularly concerned that the supervisors in the department expressed the some concerns and feel marginalized and not members of a management team. They cited policies and procedures that, in our opinion, are demeaning and sending the wrong message to them as critical members of the management team. These concerns go to the highest ronks. Even the most senior members of the agency feel that it is adrift. without focus or direction. In many ways it appears to us that this is a department without a plan or the internal ability to correct its present course. Specifically, leMA finds that: I)
The Deportment presently locks a coherent strategic plan;
2)
The Deportment presently lacks a comprehensive system for accurately recording and evaluating organizational performance (in terms of stated goals, performance benchmarks, etc.).
3)
The Deportment presently locks an effectjve mechanism for communicating a strategic vision to members of the Department;
4)
The Department lacks on effective system for accurately recording and evaluating the performance of individual members of the Department;
5)
The Department is experiencing significant obstruction(s] to internal communications that severely restrict its members from working collaboratively and effectively. Its current means of transmitting strategic messages throughout the Deportment must be oltered. The Deportment would greatly benefit from facilitated discussions and specific training to address these deficiencies.
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ICMA neither offers nor renders any opinion(s) as to the possible cause or causes of this situation. Rather, ICMA has been asked to assist the Department in moving forvvard, by opening its communication channels, setting its strategic direction, and monitoring its relative performance in achieving stated objectives. To do so, entails changing and maintaining new Departmental policies, procedures and command structures.
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C. Recommendations However serious the problems in the department are, we believe that they can be fixed. But that doing so will require time and development of a meaningful. long range plan which then must be fully implemented and monitored closely by the Town Manager and elected officials. There is no "quick fix" to these problems. However, failure to immediately begin the repair process will result in further complications, separation of quality employees and a loss of public confidence in the agency. Based upon all information that has been provided, ICMA has prepared an action plan for the Department and recommends the following specific services: I)
Assessment of CUrrent Capabilities and Consensus Building:
leMA will provide several consultants to facilitate two (2) on-site workshops designed to review and clearly articulate the Department's core mission and to identify and agree upon the Department's current organizational strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and challenges. These workshops would be attended by rank and file members of the Department and members of Town government and would be designed to accurotely assess where the Department presently is. in terms of organizational performance and expectations. The key 'takeaways' from these facilitated workshops will be a clearly stated and relevant mission statement, as well as a summary "as is" self-assessment of current police operations and capobilities. II)
Direction Setting/Strategic Planning:
ICMA will assist the Department in developing a clear strategic plan. which will inform and guide the Department's future work (in terms of specific, derivative operational plans) over the next one to three (1-3) years. The strategic plan will serve as a framework for managerial decisions by containing clearly identified overriding goals,
a dear direction, and identified performance targets and
measures. In other words, the strategic plan will assist the Department in determining where it needs to go and how exactly
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it will get there. The primary 'deliverable' will be a clear and actionable multi-year strategic plan that can be used to set. direct and evaluate organizational performance and assist the Department's benchmarking, communication and performance monitoring efforts. These services will also include assistance in developing an accurate and useful annual reporting system for the Department. III)
Performance-Management Workshops for Managers:
ICMA will provide several consultants to conduct two (2) on-site executive development training sessions for supervisors and Town government officials. These sessions will explore: 1] the history and development of Compstat and similar performance-based police management systems; and 2) practical means for developing and implementing a usable and effective performance-based management system for the Cheshire Police Department. ICMA suggests that non-managerial staff also attend, if practicable. IV)
Evaluation and Monitoring of Departmental strategic Plan and Command Staff Meetings:
ICMA will actively participate in quarterly meetings with command staff to monitor and document performance vis-a-vis stated goals. The primary purpose of such monitoring is to ensure that necessary and agreed-upon planning and performance is sustained and adequately quantified. The Department's current Command Staff meetings will be thoroughly and critically reviewed with an eye towards developing a workable performance-measurement system and setting an appropriate agenda for the Department. This review would include specific recommendations regarding making timely and accurate information more available to supervisors, enhancing decision support, opening internal communications and making both rank and file officers more accountable for the work performed. This review would include assessment of the methodology used for generating and maintaining data, and sharing content with appropriate
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audiences and stakeholders such as patrol force and external constituencies. V)
Review of Performance Assessment Capabilities:
The Department's recently designed program for reviewing the (individual) performance of its personnel will be reviewed, with necessory recommendations made for making the process more effective and useful for both supervisors and those being appraised. VI)
Review of Training Capabilities:
The staff, resources and methods of the training unit will be critically reviewed and recommendations will be made to enhance the overall quality and effectiveness of these operations. The process for selecting, scheduling and distributing both internal and external (i.e.. off-site) training throughout the Deportment will be reviewed and recommendations for improvement will be made os necessary. VII)
Review of Command Structure:
The Department's current command structure will be critically examined with special emphasis upon optimal span of control and management efficiency. The number and assignment of sworn staff will be reviewed to ensure that employees who possess the proper skills and experience ore filling the right positions. This review would also include specific recommendations for ensuring that all members of the Deportment ore held properly accountable for their work and that assignments and tasks are properly delegated throughout the entire chain of command. VIII)
Rules and Regulations:
leMA was advised that many of the Deportment's policies and procedures are very much out of dote. leMA would therefore perform a comprehensive review of such policies and procedures and assist the Department in developing a cleorly defined and
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effective system for the development, implementation and periodic review and revision of all departmental policies, procedures and guidelines. We believe that this should occur as part of a Council mandated effort to achieve CALEA accreditation.
IX)
Review of Collective Bargaining Agreement:
ICMA will review the exiting collective bargaining agreement and identify provisions that unnecessarily restrict management's ability to align resources, ensure accountability and enhance organizational performance. X)
Overtime Analysis:
ICMA will perform a detailed multi-year analysis of overtime expenditures. A major goal of this examination will be to identify and quantify those overtime expenditures that are directly related to, and result from, the practice known as schedule "swaps" which as currently administered is creating significant dissention within the agency.
XI)
Professional Responsibility/Discipline:
A detailed review of the Department's current practices and policies for the receipt, investigation and disposition of civilian and internal complaints will also be conducted, with recommendations for improvement made as necessary.
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D. Summary At the street level, the Deportment appears to be delivering on acceptable level of police service. Indeed we were struck by the commitment of the individual officers we spoke with to meet the needs and expectations of the community they serve, despite the difficult internal environment. However, immediate remedial action must be taken to ensure that the Department can move forward and maintain that level of service.
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Given the current conditions, we firmly believe that these problems can only be resolved with needed outside assistance. leMA recommends a complete change in the Department's management operations and capabilities. We believe that this can be accomplished with leMA's assistance, utilizing outside, experienced police professionals to work closely with the members of the agency, on a structured basis with clearly defined gools and objectives. This work would be closely monitored by Town management and elected officials. If the Town engages leMA and proceeds with our recommendations, the police chief and his staff should be told in no uncertain terms that this process must be implemented, that significant, measurable progress must be made and, absent that, that the Town would consider taking the appropriate actions for what would be failure to perform assigned responsibilities.
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