A D.C. police plan to beef up weekend patrols in Georgetown and Dupont Circle has angered rank-and-file officers who will be working weekends all summer under the new initiative.
The move is needed in the Second District, where crime spikes on the weekends, said Inspector Edward Delgado, especially during the summer, when out-of-towners pour into the area’s popular shops and nightclubs. It will require most patrol officers to cancel weekend plans, officials said.
Delgado said it made no sense to have 80 out of 100 patrol officers off during the busy weekends. Officers selected for weekend duty were chosen by seniority.
The shooting of seven residents earlier this month demonstrated the need for the district commanders to adjust their schedules, said Assistant Police Chief Diane Groomes. The brass plans to repeat the initiative in the First, Fifth and Seventh police districts, police sources said.
The initiative comes nearly a year after the Second District absorbed Dupont Circle and the surrounding neighborhoods to help take some pressure off the higher-crime Third District.
Crime in the Second District during the first five months this year has increased by 8 percent, according to police. Assaults with a deadly weapon have increased 10 percent, burglary is up 11 percent and thefts are up by 7 percent.
Police union chief Kristopher Baumann called the initiative “a morale killer.” The plan is particularly hard on divorced parents whose visitation days are set by the courts, said one officer from the district.
Baumann’s shop contacted the 20 largest metropolitan police departments, and none had ever canceled weekend days off, he said, adding the city’s command staff should have planned for the traditional summer crime spike sooner.
“We have the only management team in the country that is so inept that they don’t know that crime goes up in the summer,” he said.
