If elections for mayor were held today and Police Chief Joe St. John was a candidate, I wouldn”t want to be in the race. The crazy upshot of the chief”s latest misstep seems to be a spike in his popularity.
This is, after all, Possum Town.
At the Sounds of Summer concert Thursday night at Riverside Park, some in the audience were wearing T-shirts and fluorescent yellow stickers that said “Keep Chief St. John.” Meanwhile, the chief — ever gregarious, ever the social butterfly — was there working the crowd, Joe just being Joe. “Irrepressible” is the word that comes to mind.
But despite his charisma, St. John”s in hot water after he was tested for alcohol — and tested positive — the same day he failed to show at a June 17 Civil Service Commission hearing for two officers who were appealing the 20-workday suspensions he had recommended.
Rather than let attorneys know he was going to miss the hearing, he sent a text to a subordinate and asked her to notify the already assembled group that he was sick.
In December 2008, St. John took a leave of absence to rein in a drinking problem.
The council held a special-called meeting Monday to determine St. John”s fate. I happened to sit next to a councilman at lunch the day of the meeting. He didn”t know what was going to happen, but thought it possible the council would fire the chief that afternoon. The councilman said he”d been on the phone all morning with St. John supporters.
Apparently, he wasn”t the only one. The council delayed action on St. John until its next regularly scheduled meeting on the 19th.
Every time something like this comes up, our online commentators bring up the fisticuffs between the mayor and Kabir Karriem at City Hall last year. Why discipline anyone at all, if the mayor and a councilman can duke it out with impunity? What moral authority do they have? It”s a valid question. You can ask the same thing about St. John. How can he discipline if he”s not disciplined for his transgressions?
And, I”m sorry, but, unless he was in a hospital bed, St. John should have been at that meeting.
An interesting side note to the Smith/Kabir incident illustrates divergent cultural mores between the black and white communities. A black friend told me that among blacks the fight between the mayor and Kabir was no big deal. In fact, he said, the mayor acted with restraint.
“Kabir was lucky he didn”t get worse,” he said. “He had no business going up there at that time of night getting in the mayor”s face.”
The white community, on the other hand, shakes its head.
But, back to Joe. He cares, he”s involved (He reads to kids at Mother Goose”s Story Hour.) and he”s approachable — he”s given the public his cell phone number. He answers it when you call. He”s single-handedly changed public perceptions of the police department. With Joe there, you”ve got a friend down at CPD. There”s plenty to be said for that.
Is the police department effective under St. John”s leadership? I”m not sure how you gauge that. Should he stay or go? The council terminated firefighter Mitchell Banks in 2009 for being too hung over attend a training session at a Jackson seminar. How is this different?
The mayor and council owe it to the community to flesh out all the details, make a full disclosure to the public and then mete out the appropriate punishment.
As we wrote in an editorial last week, the council should examine the evidence and make a decision consistent with city policy.
Yes, a little consistency might be good for a change.
Birney Imes is the publisher of The Commercial Dispatch. E-mail him at [email protected].
Birney Imes III is the immediate past publisher of The Dispatch.
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