You're driving our money, so we need some answers
Star-Telegram staff writer
We spend $3 million a year buying police cars in Fort Worth.
We don't want to see those cars -- filled with our gas -- driven on personal trips to other towns.
In particular, we don't want to see our cars idling in a different county at 3 a.m.
Nor do we want to hear that police there found an off-duty Fort Worth officer asleep behind the wheel.
I have some questions about the arrest of that officer in Burleson on his way home early last Sunday.
But my questions go beyond basic curiosity about where a 32-year-old officer had gone for nine hours that night after finishing his work shift in our patrol car.
I wonder whether Fort Worth lets too many officers take cars home. I wonder whether our cars should ever be taken home to rural Johnson County and other outlying areas. And I wonder whether police should have stricter rules for driving our cars.
From what I can tell, the Fort Worth officer was about three miles from his rural home when Burleson police found him.
According to a Burleson police spokeswoman, the officer was asleep behind the wheel with the patrol car idling in gear on the southbound access road of Interstate 35W, a half-block from the East Renfro Street turn into rural Johnson County.
A Burleson officer turned off the ignition and arrested the Fort Worth officer on suspicion of driving while intoxicated.
He had been off duty for nine hours. That was plenty of time to have gone straight home, even after working a race day at Texas Motor Speedway.
But unlike Tarrant County, Fort Worth doesn't have a written policy saying that employees who need tax-funded cars round-the-clock must go straight home.
Some Fort Worth officers have been taking cars home for 10 years, with mostly good results. Officers who might be called out at any hour can keep their equipment loaded and keep a single car in good condition.
In a city that sprawls 40 miles wide, it makes no sense to have officers drive 10 miles into town in freeway traffic to pick up a patrol car and drive it another 10 miles back out to one of the newer neighborhoods.
Remember, Fort Worth's cars are funded directly by the Crime Control and Prevention District sales tax. That's up for voter renewal every few years.
If the Police Department wants more money to buy more new cars -- and if the City Council wants to keep voters happy -- then those cars must be guarded carefully.
Police have rules about which officers can take cars home and where they can drive them, Deputy Chief Kenneth Flynn explained.
The officer arrested in Burleson was one of about 60 "zero tolerance" officers subject to call anytime and expected to carry special gear. With approval, officers who are always on call can take cars home anywhere, inside or outside the city, Flynn said.
Officers are told not to use the cars as a family sedan and not to take the cars to a private security job unless it's on the way to or from their regular duty shift, Flynn said. Generally, supervisors must OK how cars are used.
But Tarrant County officials have a specific, stricter rule.
"You're allowed to use the car only going to and from duty," County Administrator G.K. Maenius said. "If you stop at a grocery store on the way home, we don't mind as long as it's an incidental stop. But you can't make it your primary car, or take it out on Saturday and go shopping. Those cars are only for county business, and we don't want to see them anywhere that doesn't involve county business."
Both Fort Worth and Tarrant County let some employees take cars home wherever they live, even far outside the county. In the recent Republican Party primaries, candidates for Tarrant County constable debated whether our cars should be driven outside the county.
"These deputies are out at night serving writs all over," Maenius said. "We decided that as long as they start work on time for the people of Tarrant County and don't leave work early, we're not going to set rules about where they can live."
Both city police and county officials are watching the ever-rising gas prices.
"That's our greatest concern now," Maenius said.
Ours, too -- among others.
Bud Kennedy's column appears Sundays, Wednesdays and Fridays. 817-390-7538
