Al punto. Hola, qué tal?

Bienvenidos! Les saluda gabriela teissier.

Iniciemos con esta información. Y es que surgió un análisis que dice que en los últimos 20 años la delincuencia en long beach ha ido en descenso, un descenso de 19% en crímenes violentos de esa ciudad.

También festejaron el hecho de que de 2024 a 2025 habría habido un 25% menos crímenes a la propiedad y 30% menos homicidios. Así es que hoy saludamos al jefe de policía de long beach, wally evers.

Gracias por estar con nosotros. Ahora.

Qué es lo que ha funcionado bien, particularmente en el último año? Well, first of all.

Thank you, gabriella. I appreciate you giving me an opportunity to to come on and and speak a little bit about our community and about our police department.

And, uh, and share some of the things that that we've been doing over the past year and some of the things were planning for the future. And um, you know in terms of what?

What is working? Well, or what has been working?

Well, and while we are where we are. I think it really is about.

You know we were meeting today. It's about community and police partnerships and relationships and increasing our capacity to engage with our community .

Um through a variety of different methods our entire community long beach is a diverse city. Um, there are different department.

And being able to connect to our entire population is of the most important to me into the men and women who serve the city of long beach and our police department . And really what sparked?

Uh, wanting to come here. Today was was one thinking about the progress.

We've made over the past year our ability to reduce crime in the city and major crime. Categories our ability to increase hiring and staffing in the department in a time where law enforcement is facing uh, one of the uh in unprecedented historic staffing crisis a challenge in hiring.

Yeah, and then lastly. What's happening everywhere ?

And, uh, and just being able to kind of share your message of of who we are what we represent and um and the values of the people who make up this department. Actualmente, los miembros de la comunidad también están preocupados por los operativos migratorios en todas partes.

Pero en long beach. Cuál es la posición de su departamento?

Yeah! Very important question a very important question during a very important time in.

Uh, we have department policies. We have city ordinances.

We have state laws and we have federal laws and we follow and comply with all of those things and so when we talk about what's happening with immigration? I have to start by saying that i and the members of this police department.

Share the very same concerns in anxiety and sometimes fear that's associated with what we see happening, but we do not enforce immigration. The police department does not take immigration enforcement action and do not support immigration enforcement operations.

What we do support is public safety public safety for everyone, but we're guided by the laws the policies and the ordinances that we have in place and we comply with those laws. And so you know in california we have a values act in the city of longbeach.

We have a long beach values act and in the police department. We have an immigration policy and that policy dictates when officers can be involved in anything related to criminal immigration enforcement which is is um guided by again.

The long beach values act and state law and so uh, our response to what you're asking me about is to be accessible to be approachable to be responsive and to be engaged with our community our entire immigrant community which makes up such a big part of the city of long beach community in which we spent decades building trust and relationships with and we will continue to do. So i , i myself am in immigrant.

I have numerous immigrants at work in my police department. So this is part of the community.

And i think it is important for us to you know really part of this. This conversation for me is important for us to be able to are here for you.

Now they're i have to manage expectations and speak in in in realistic terms of what we can and can't do. Obstruct or get in the way of lawful enforcement operations.

But what we can do is offer some resources offer some guidance and and give our community some assurances on what they're able to do in response to whatever is happening. Su departamento tenía un long beach y decidió no renovarlo al final del 2024.

Se acabó eso. Está usted satisfecho con la decisión y lo que ocurre hoy por hoy, al final de la línea del metro?

Yeah! So i'm i'm sort of chuckling gabriela because i wasn't expecting you to ask me about metro.

So a little backstory to to metro. Yes, uh, the the exploration of the contract.

We completed our contract and the completion of the contract was the right thing to do for our city and our department at this time because of the staffing crisis that i had mentioned earlier metro had certain requirements for staffing or needs for staffing increases that we just weren't capable of accommodations and rather than pulling police officers off the streets of long beach and putting them on the metro. Um, it's it's more effective in beneficial policing model to put those officers back in the field where they can serve the community.

We still respond in and around the metro to assist them with any any safety needs including the drop off at the end of line. Um, and we still work with metro as a partner especially as we're approaching twenty twenty eight and the olympic games and what will be a busy time for all law enforcement and they recently hired a a new chief who i'm friends with and familiar with from his time in ilia in san francisco and so um i see a collaboration in the future.

And if there are needs that come up in the city of long beach. That are directly associated with metro.

Um, my hope is to be able to pick up the phone and and get some assistance. Los residentes y también la gente de negocios en el centro de long beach tuvieron terribles experiencias cuando el fin de la línea del metro.

Pero usted diría que ahora esa zona del centro de long beach es más segura. Yeah.

I believe it is safer. I believe if if you look at, uh, the reporting and in the statistics that shows a decline in some of the the major crimes.

Um, however, i say that with caution because safety is about a feeling as well, and if i have community members or business owners or residents telling me well, i have to listen to that and while the statistics may not necessarily reflect that their stories could reflect that and so again. I'm very focused on communicating directly with our community.

And i don't me personally, but i our department and one of the things that that is is ask our community our businesses our residents. How they're feeling about safety?

Yes, we have statistics to show crime trends and whether or not crime is going up or going down or what the what the workload is based on calls for service, but what are your testimonials about how you re feeling? And what are you sharing with us?

So we can come up with strategies and partnerships to address those feelings and make you feel safer in your community and so when i look at various areas. I , this is a data informed police department so i look at i look at crime statistics all the time so when i look at crime and a specific area.

I'm looking at statistics so when we have our evaluating statistics, but i'm also asking the city chiefs and division commanders. What is a community saying?

What are the officers saying? What are we seeing?

That's not being reported. How do we address the safety element of reducing crime and enhancing safety.

What are you doing about that? And what strategies can we implement and so i think it's important to to address statistics, but also just be very open and realistic about um when somebody doesn't feel safe that matters as well.

Vamos a darle las gracias al jefe de policía de long beach, wally evers. Thank you very much