Page 35 - FOP Magazine August 2020

The Lodge response will only inten- sify to address the frustration members are expressing about how the run of 15 or 16 consecutive 12-hour days has led to feeling the Department has abandoned them.
“When you have people wreaking hav- oc on the city, obviously you take it per- sonally,” confides Lodge 7 Trustee Tim Fitzpatrick, who was recently injured during one of those 15-day marathons. “You want to make sure those people go to jail for a long time and unfortunately the powers that be aren’t really taking that serious. It seems like they are work- ing against us instead of with us in order to help save the city.”
Safety matters
The most viral case of pushing mem- bers too far invaded Grant Park on July 17 and elicited response and reaction that capsulizes the need for Lodge 7 to assert how much members’ lives matter. Even the superintendent was moved to disgust in the post-protest press con- ference, reporting that with 18 of the 52 injured winding up in the hospital, fire- works being hurled at the police and PVC pipe used to hold “Black Lives Matter” flags being sharpened and used to jab officers they should all now approach ev- ery protest as if it would turn violent.
The numbers speak for themselves, but the Lodge made sure to speak about them so the media, the public and the mayor would not mistake how much the city has been pushing its luck. The record number of 2,300 shootings through the first seven months of 2020 includes 405 people who have been killed and 1,895 who have been wounded in a city of 2.7 million people. Further context details that New York City, with its 8.7 million population, has reported 664 shootings through July 22. And Los Angeles, which has 4 million people, has reported 549 shootings through July 18.
So how has all of the above affected the mindset and motivation of Chicago Po- lice Officers?
“In my 25 years, I would say this is the hardest year,” admits Steve Olson, a Lodge trustee who works in 010. “What everybody is going through and the way society is, it’s been quite difficult.”
Reasons to push back just keep com- ing. In 014, officers had to deal with be- ing detailed to guard the mayor’s house against a protest rally and face malicious verbal and physical abuse in the process. Lodge Trustee Pablo Claudio describes the fallout from working that assign- ment, not to mention all the others.
“It makes it hard for them to do their jobs because they’re constantly afraid they’re going to make a mistake, some-
body is going to catch them on video and they’re going to be looking at a CR,” rea- sons Claudio, who works in 014.
Too many incidents of officer safe- ty being compromised at protests have bubbled up for the Lodge not to raise hell. An officer in 001 went to save his partner, who was being grabbed by mul- tiple offenders ripping at his vest. He would have reached for his radio to call for backup, but he didn’t even have a ra- dio, due to the one-for-every-four allot- ment.
To add insult to injuries, the Depart- ment has been topping unsafe working conditions with unfair working condi- tions. There was the canceling of days off, of course, in June and July that mucked up members who had family events and vacations planned, not to mention ex- acerbating the childcare challenges that have become more acute with the pan- demic. But the subsequent canceling of the canceled days off coming in July an hour before officers were about to go on is part of the inhuman treatment piled on to 12-hour tours in locations with no bathrooms and no way to take lunch.
“We had members who were told they
The messages are nothing short of ee- rie, with such lines as:
Stop economic brutality to Chicago Po- lice.
Solidarity.
Chicago unfair to police. Arbitrate or negotiate.
Chicago Mayor DELAY! Arbitrate now.
The “DELAY” is a play on “Daley,” as in the Chicago Mayor making life oh so difficult for Chicago Police Officers back then. Sound familiar?
The messages are a harbinger of Lodge 7 perpetuating the pushback loud and clear today. A 2020 version of the sign might read something like “Chicago Mayor light foot in mouth!” Certainly af- ter all the destruction the protesting has caused and all the objects and insults that have been hurled at members, in- cluding that one the mayor directed at the FOP president, city hall and the city council might give as much credence to the concerns Lodge 7 is voicing as they have in caving to the anti-police voices.
“Stop all this rhetoric, all this crap on TV and just sit down and talk,” Claudio articulates. “As FOP president, John is in a position to help her. So sit down and
Chicago Lodge 7 members have been holding the line at protests throughout the city the past two months, all the while risking their safety and enduring physical and verbal abuse.
were working 12-hour days and they wound up working 15-hour days,” Jak- stavich reveals. “Members were unaware of the shift changes. They would get four hours of sleep and have to return back to work. What do you do?”
Signs of the times
Jakstavich recently posted framed signs gifted to him in his office at Lodge 7 headquarters. Officer Joseph T. Kirk, Star #14084, gathered these posters after he came on in 1969. His daughter, Terri Kaliszewski, found them when she was cleaning out her garage and sent them to the FOP.
have a conversation about what’s best for the city of Chicago, what’s best for the community and what’s best for the police.”
There is a reason TV news outlets con- tinue to stalk Catanzara for interviews. His sound bites are the residual of his bark and continually capture what mem- bers would say if they could without fear of retribution. The letter he sent to Presi- dent Trump that went viral on social me- dia expressed exactly how members view the current state of “unwilling or unable to maintain law and order here.”
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