Skip to main content

Vice President Biden To Police: "We Owe You. We Owe You Big."

Vice President Joe Biden visited Alexandria, Virginia’s newly built police headquarters to congratulate the department for being awarded a nearly $860,000 grant to its Community Oriented Policing Services (or COPS) program.
Vice President Biden with Alexandria, Virginia Chief of Police, Earl Cook.  Photo/CD Brown.
Vice President Biden highlighted how President Obama’s American Jobs Act would keep first responders like police, fire and emergency personnel on the job.
“We owe you.  We owe you big”, said the Vice President. “We owe you every tool available for you not only to keep the community safe, but to keep you safe.”
The president’s Jobs bill, which he is hoping to pass with the support of Congress, sets aside $5 billion for law enforcement officials to hire new personnel and avoid layouts.
Said Biden, “This award gives you the tools you need.”
Alexandria’s Chief of police Earl Cook knows all too well about losing essential personnel.  Alexandria’s police department suffered a lost nine personnel during the height of the recession.
“We’re still trying to provide the same level of service with less resources”, the chief explained.  “As we try to sustain a lower crime rate it’s becoming increasingly difficult to do that with less resources than we had three years ago.”



“It’s important that officers on the street have what they need, said Sergeant Gwen Diggs, a thirteen year veteran of the force.”
Those ‘resources’ not only include personnel, but vital equipment necessary to do the job such as tasers, radio and other communication devices and also includes an investment to develop and deploy a nationwide, interoperable wireless network for public safety.
The Alexandria police department was one of four cities in Virginia to receive funding.   The City of Norfolk was awarded the most with $1.07 million.  The city of Annapolis received the largest award for the state of Maryland with $926,350, while The District of Columbia’s Metropolitan Police Department  received $1.4 million.  Other police departments across the country were also awarded funds.
Two hundred and forty million dollars was made available for the program.  More than $5 billion in requests were received.   Said Biden, "That’s just an idea of how badly communities around the country are hurting.”
With the newly awarded funds, Alexandria, Virginia’s police chief already has plans for its use. “We plan to recover personnel positions lost in the area of community policing, as well as the department’s Domestic Violence program”, said Cook.

Next month is Domestic Violence awareness month, and  Vice President Biden has been a staunch advocate against domestic violence.
Cook is the city’s first African American chief of police.  He replaced David Baker after Baker resigned following a DUI incident resulting in a car crash in 2009.
The new police headquarters, located at 3600 Wheeler Road, officially opens its doors October 17, 2011.

GOP Opposition  (What Else Is New?)
 
The administration may not consider its proposed Jobs Bill 'class warfare', but the GOP certainly sees it as a war on the rich, especially since it suggests raising taxes on the wealthiest Americans -  an idea they strongly oppose.
Vice President Biden, quoting President Obama, laid out the plan to yesterday's attendees for finding funding sources for first responders, and other essential personnel. 
Simply make the rich pay their fair share.
Explained Biden, using Wall Street as an example, "The top twenty-five hedge fund managers make $23b, but pay a 15% tax.  Americans pay at 28%.   I don’t get that.  How is that fair?  If hedge fund managers just pay the same rate that the middle class pays, that’s $12b to cover all the cost of law enforcement over the next several years."
“It’s about our police department keeping you and themselves safe. 
 
Biden said the Obama Administration will fight like crazy to ensure the nation’s police personnel have what they need to do their jobs.
“To me this is a simple deal.  We said we’ve give you what you need,  just by making some stark choices on our value system.
 
“Its’ just fair.”

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

President Biden's EV Agenda

  Electric Vehicles   President Biden’s Investing in America Agenda is Unleashing a Manufacturing and Clean Energy Boom and Accelerating the Production of Affordable Electric Vehicles   As part of President Biden’s goal of having 50 percent of all new vehicle sales be electric by 2030, the White House is announcing the first set of public and private commitments to support America's historic transition to electric vehicles (EV) under the EV Acceleration Challenge.   These commitments are part of President Biden's  Investing in America  agenda to spur domestic manufacturing, strengthen supply chains, boost U.S. competitiveness and create good-paying jobs. Because of President Biden’s leadership and historic investments, electric vehicle sales have tripled and the number of publicly available charging ports has grown by over 40 percent since he took office. There are now more than three million EVs on the road and over 135,000 public EV chargers across the country.     President

President Biden discusses America's economy during July 4th address to military families.

"Our Economy is the strongest in the world."  " . ..  Our economy is growing, but not without pain.  Liberty is under assault -- assault both here and abroad.  In recent days, there's been reason to think that this country is moving backward, that  freedom  is being reduced, that rights we assumed were protected are no longer.  A reminder that we remain in an ongoing battle for the soul of America, as we have for over 200 years.  4th of July photo courtesy of - the Internet. I know it can be exhausting and unsettling.  But tonight, I want you to know we're going to get through all of this -- for all that we have faced, that we are going to get through this, and look how far we've come.    We're reclaiming our way of life in a pandemic.  Vaccines are nearly available to every American, restrictions lifted, the Fourth of July together again at the White House.    And for all the challenges, America has the strongest economy in the world.  More people are wo

(OTR): The White House on Hamas Terrorist Attack

 Tip: long read. FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE October 10, 2023 VIRTUAL ON-THE-RECORD GAGGLE BY NSC COORDINATOR FOR STRATEGIC COMMUNICATIONS JOHN KIRBY ON HAMAS TERRORIST ATTACKS IN ISRAEL   Via Teleconference 5:54 P.M. EDT   MR. KIRBY:  Good evening, everybody.  As you know, the White House has been closely following the situation in Israel, and the President has been actively engaged, regularly receiving updates on the latest developments from the national security team.  In fact, this morning, he met with members of the senior team -- including the Secretary of State; National Security Advisor; the Principal Deputy National Security Advisor; the Homeland Security Advisor, Liz Sherwood-Randall; and, of course, the White House Chief of Staff, Jeff Zients -- all to receive the latest update from -- from the morning.     He has also spoken twice with Prime Minister Netanyahu this -- over the weekend, certainly to express our deep sympathy for all those missing, wounded, and killed and to pledge