Lucas County...a local rant

Yeah okay some of this might not interest those of you from other areas but I started thinking about this more yesterday so if nothing else perhaps it will be entertaining and for some of you might be what you experience in your own local areas.

I live in the burbs outside of Toledo, Ohio. Toledo is having some financial problems especially when it comes to providing enough police protection. Add to that recently there was a shortage of 911 operators so they had to move some Toledo policemen from desk jobs to man the phones.

Then drive out to the burbs....Here in my little area we have the local police department, the Lucas County Sheriff substation and the Highway Patrol. So many law enforcement and it's obvious they have very little to do most times but to harrass people.

Out here on slow days the thing to do is to create these "Highway Patrol Inspection" zones, where it takes three officers, and they pull in cars to cite you for things that technically you shouldn't even be cited for. (It's not a ticket where there is a monetary fine, they just give you the piece of paper, tell you that you are bad to fix it and then NO STICKER FOR YOU a soup nazi type thing) No they didn't get me this time but in the past I've been pulled over and cited for not having a front license plate when our state law clearly states if the car wasn't manufactured with one I don't have to have one installed. So I never get the cute little "inspection passed" sticker that's supposed to save me from getting pulled over for one of these for at least a year. My only ticket ever was earlier in the year when a Highway Patrol car decided to pull me over for not having a front plate when in reality it was the fact that my daughter hadn't pulled her seat belt on immediately. Just as we were pulling out of a car repair shop I saw she didn't have it on and told her...buckle up....the cop saw her do this and then proceeded to pull me over "because I didn't have a front plate" then tried to write me a ticket for my daughter not wearing her belt. I stated we were not on the road when she buckled up we were still in a private drive. I also stated that I'm not required to have a front plate on my car because it wasn't manufactured with one and pointed out to her several cars driving down the road that didn't have front plates on asking if she was going to go flag them down next. At that time they couldn't pull you over for not wearing a seat belt alone so they "make up" reasons to pull you over though I understand they are trying to change the law so they can pull you over for that alone. (Being such an infamous felon around here, it took two Highway Patrol, a Lucas County Sheriff and the local police department to all show up for my ticket event, I'm sure to the eye of the drivers going by I was certainly a criminal of major importance to have that many officers all pulled over in a row behind my car.) So I got cited with a ticket and it was then her word against mine that I was in the private lot and not on the road, nor did the judge seem to care that the entire reason to given to pull me over wasn't a valid one. Sure I probably should have had an attorney but should we have to pay extra in that case over something that should have been tossed out?

Now you can say I'm biased against some of the local law enforcement and our courts here, you'd be right. Which is why I posted the above personal experience so you can make your own determination as to my "bias".

That said it makes no sense for one area to be short handed and not have enough police to make calls when here, let there be one traffic stop and you have at least one more sometimes two other officers arrive. OMG it's a ticket stop!!! Let's all party!!!

In Toledo somehow they manage to have only one officer be able to write out a ticket, here in the burbs whenever there is a stop there is always more than one car that ends up showing up. For a call, even once when bicycles were stolen and I took it upon myself to look for them and found not only one of ours but several others, it took four sheriff's cars to handle that call. Visit a local carry out and they in sheer boredom will run the plates on your car (yes on private property) if they find something wrong with the tag or plate they will wait until you start to pull out of the carryout and pull you over on the road (I've seen this happen too many times to count during my years of living out here).

At night, nothing for them to do? They run plates and then driver's license info on cars parked in driveways and if they find something? Knock knock on your door no matter the time. I know of several situations of people who had very old warrants for silly things that were woken up and arrested in the middle of the night with of course the party patrol being present, because out here it takes at least four law enforcement cars to do this. Sure they were very bad people for having old warrants out there -- one of the was a real criminal -- it was for a 35 dollar bad check that he thought had been taken care of. Yep it's taken care of now but he was dragged out of bed at 4 in the morning, driven to the city line where the Toledo Police had to come pick him up, then taken to the jail, then released two hours later because he wasn't a violent offender. When he complained about how he was treated it was like oh well you did something wrong so even if they did something wrong it was your fault anyway. I could relate numerous other stories from the trailer park days of seeing similar things happen. No we were not a bunch of lawbreaking miscreants, we just got alot of attention since the Sheriff substation was right next door. Drug dealing happened and very little was done but watch out for those expired tags and don't let there ever be a non-working turn signal. Make sure you appear in court if you have a court judgement against you for a bill owed and don't have a source of income they can garnish. If you don't? They'll be happy to send a bailiff out to your house to arrest you and bring you in, so you can answer to the judge about your finances, and have to post a bond too, amazingly always in the amount of what is owed to the creditor. Yes debtor's prison techniques are alive and well here in this area.

Now I realize that makes it sound like this is a horrible place to live, and it's not, for many reasons I love living here, I just don't like this aspect of it. There is a duty to protect and serve, however to me there is a line between protecting and serving and harrassment. Another personal example, my oldest daughter was in a car accident two years ago, it happened in Toledo, (one yes just one lone officer from Toledo managed to handle the accident rather than the four or five if it's a really "good" crash out here). My husband went out to the scene to help Emily, he was concerned about there being no headlight (the guy hit her right at the corner of the car and the headlight was totally shorn off) because duh out here it's an issue and asked the Toledo Policewoman if it was okay to drive the car home or did we have to have it towed. She looked at him like he was crazy, "There's no reason you can't drive it home". He then asked about getting written a ticket because the headlight wasn't working. "We don't have the time to deal with things like that here" she replied. He told her that were we live it's something they pull over for, she looked at Emily's drivers license again, saw the town name, shook her head and told him if Emily is pulled over she has 30 days to fix the car that to tell them the police report is on file for the accident.

We all pay the same County taxes, even those who live in Toledo, infact here where I live we don't pay a local income tax as Toledo does. Wouldn't it make more sense if Toledo is really short on officers to move some of these local county Sheriff's into the city where they are really needed? They could easily take over the 911 operator calls freeing up the Toledo Police to be able to do their jobs more efficiently. I also realize the whole separate department thing, but you'd think there would be a way that these poor bored souls could be put to work in a manner that would be of use to those who really need help. People who are waiting for a real call that is important rather than sitting in private parking lots scoping out license plates or as right in front of my home yesterday...making sure those "good people" who bought cars that were made with front license plates got stickers.