Is the NOPD prepared for returnees? National Guard, active duty figures.
Tags: nopd, national guardFrom "Crimefighting Faces Challenge in Big Easy":
[…911 is a joke…]
"We just don't have enough police officers to handle the calls we're getting," said New Orleans Councilman Jay Batt, who has received calls from more than 100 other residents with similar concerns…
The streets of New Orleans are patrolled now by a much-reduced force.
The National Guard whose uniformed soldiers and Humvees were a daily fixture in the weeks immediately after Hurricane Katrina now has 2,361 people in New Orleans, down from more than 6,000 after the storm struck Aug. 29, said a spokesman, Lt. Col. Pete Schneider.
Some see the absence of such patrols today as a sign of progress, but others say it increases the strain on the city's already-fractured police force.
About 300 federal, state and out-of-state officers remain on the streets, [NOPD spokesman Capt. Marlon Defillo] said, as little as one-tenth the level after Katrina hit. The city's police force is said to number about 1,500, down about 200 officers from before the storm…
But, what about the phantom NOPD cops?
The active-duty military has 257 people in Louisiana, but all but a dozen are medical support personnel. That's in contrast to just under 20,000 active-duty personnel right after Katrina…
