A day after shots were fired toward two Cincinnati Police officers, FOP President, Dan Hils says he’s concerned about officer safety on the streets.
Hils says the department is rank-heavy and preferred assignments have taken more officers off the street than he can ever remember. Right now, there are 1,003 uniform officers on the force. Hils says he continues to hear from more and more of them about unsafe conditions on the street.
“They have different instances where they didn’t have the manpower, and it made them feel their safety was being jeopardized,” said Hils.
Hils hopes to continue to gather more information before sitting down with top brass and the city manager.
“Right now, I have more anecdotal stories than I have hard evidence,” said Hils.
On Monday, two officers, both riding solo, responded to a call to break up an unruly dice game in Evanston. Seconds after arriving, they found themselves chasing two teens, one of which police believed fired several shots in the vicinity of the officers.
“It’s the summertime, things get busy. We have a lot of training and we have summer vacations. So, that’s where we feel the pinch and that’s where our folks out there are feeling a little too alone sometimes,” said Hils.
Recently retired police Lt. Bill Nastold also has concerns for officer safety after serving nearly 30 years with CPD.
“The biggest thing is the gun violence,” said Nastold. “An attack on a law enforcement officer is an attack on everybody. These men and women are being attacked; we have to worry about our safety because they are the ones providing it.”
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