NCJ Number
82523
Journal
Journal of Police Science and Administration Volume: 10 Issue: 1 Dated: (March 1982) Pages: 43-46
Date Published
1982
Length
4 pages
Annotation
Barriers to the consolidation of law enforcement agencies in a plan to consolidate municipal governments with the parish government in Lafayette Parish, La., are discussed.
Abstract
In the fall of 1980, the voters of Lafayette Parish were asked to express their will on a consolidation charter calling for the merger of the six existing municipal governments with the parish government. Under the proposed consolidation charter, all major local government services within the parish would have been unified under the direction of a parish president and a city-parish council, with the exception of law enforcement, which would have remained mostly unconsolidated. While the charter did call for the abolition or absorption of the five small town police agencies, the two major agencies, the Lafayette Police Department and the Lafayette Parish Sheriff's Department, each with more than 150 employees, would have remained intact. The sheriff, who is mandated by the State constitution to be the chief law enforcement officer in the parish was willing to head a consolidated department provided that his employees were not part of a civil service personnel system. The sheriff argued that having his employees under civil service would not only reduce his effective control over his department but would be an unconstitutional abridgement of the sheriff's powers. The State attorney general supported this contention. The Lafayette police, however, who were under civil service, did not want to give up the benefits afforded them by such a status. The charter commission lacked the authority to break the stalemate, so the only alternative was to keep the two departments as essentially separate agencies under the consolidation proposal. Two references are listed.