At-large D.C. Councilman Phil Mendelson told The Washington Examiner that he wants the executive branch, and not the legislative, to handle concerns about the police department’s breast-feeding policy.
The Examiner has reported how a policy change meant to push healthy officers from desk duty to the street has also sent breast-feeding police officers back to patrol before they’re ready. In one case, an officer has been forced onto leave without pay.
Mendelson, who heads the council’s public safety committee, has been silent on the issue, or at least until Wednesday when he said: “I want these things to be worked out by the administration. It’s better than the council, which is a political body, weighing in every time there’s a controversy.”
To that, police union chief Kris Baumann let loose this salvo: “The fact that Councilmember Mendelson is willing to protect pregnant firefighters, but is completely silent about the treatment of female police officers is not surprising. It is Councilmember Mendelson’s disdain and dislike of police that has led us to the current situation where we are down 400 police officers.”
Baumann is referring to Mendelson’s recent and direct involvement in a controversial fire department policy for pregnant firefighters, which after months of questions from Mendelson is now being changed.
