When I was growing up Memorial Day to me meant a BBQ, a nice 3-day weekend, the end of the school year, finals, graduation, etc. Not once was I taught what it really meant. I saw the flags at the different gravesites at the cemetery, and thought it was for that died during WWII – I wasn’t wrong but that wasn’t the whole story. I fell among that generation where they stopped teaching Civics in high school and replaced it with something else. We learned about The Constitution, the Bill of Rights, WWII and other wars, but not the importance behind these things. I never learned until I enlisted and started reading for myself the importance of our Rights as Americans and the meaning behind Armed Forces Day, Memorial Day, and Veteran’s Day. The ones that don’t quite get it, will be the ones that party hearty, drink all they can, eat all they can, etc. Most Vets you’ll see as a different lot, more somber than the rest. I haven’t done a BBQ or anything publically celebrating Memorial Day in a long time, with the exception of the local parade honoring those who gave their lives for our rights and our freedom. It is a sobering time for me, reflecting on the true meaning of the holiday, as I am sure it is for many others. I never say Happy Memorial Day because I know what the day means, but when someone, usually a civilian, wishes me a Happy Memorial Day, I don’t bother correcting them because I know they mean well.

Given the recent events concerning school safety, there are measures that should have been put in place right after the Columbine school shooting. There is a way to be proactive instead of reactive, but of course the question always comes up – Who would shoot up a school? Society views school as a safe place to be – who would want to hurt children? Children are off limits when it comes to violence of the world, or they should be. But everyone forgets the kid that gets bullied on a regular basis, and now has the help of TV and video games to help them succeed in their quest for revenge. Parents don’t think to lock up their guns at home – what for?? Front door is locked. No one ever thinks about the threat from being inside.
The safety of children should be paramount to all other things – we use weapons to guard against bank robbery, there are guns guarding a court house, there are countless private security guarding our politicians. Why are the children considered to be less important than any of these things? Time to take some of that money set aside for emergencies and take care of what is really important – our children.

Even though as Military Police we primarily deal with active duty and reserve personnel, on occasion we do have to deal with dependent and/or civilian juveniles that are on base for one reason or another. When I was stationed at Portsmouth Naval Hospital there was a Pediatric Clinic there on the compound which meant kids were on base for appointments, or were there accompanying their parents at their appointment. Most minors were not allowed to roam the base without adult supervision, but on occasion they would go the small gift shop at the hospital to hang out while waiting for their parents. On one particular occasion, a handful of minors were accused to shoplifting from the gift shop. Unfortunately, the entrance the store and the store itself were very close so to take one step out of bounds the alarm would usually sound. Security was called to escort the minors back to the Security Office for safe keeping while the parents were located. The handling of minors can be a very touchy situation, especially since they are minors and you cannot question them about anything without an adult present. This case was not so serious in that no one had actually shop lifted anything from the shop but most adults are very mistrusting when it comes to unaccompanied minors. A warning was issued, but it was also a good lesson to those attached to the Security Department in the handling of minors and infractions committed by them.

Military police, just like their counterpart the law enforcement professional, are accountable for their actions both on and off the job. Military police follow a different set of rules, the Uniform Code of Military Justice, than state or local police do, and it can be more severe depending on the infraction. Usually once a military police officer is charged with an infraction of the UCMJ they can no longer be a military police officer. Those local and state law enforcement officials that conduct themselves in a way that violates their policies might just receive a suspension or a reprimand but will not get kicked off the force.
There is a reason why the military is so strict when it comes to their police officers; we are expected to follow a stricter code of ethics and behavior than those of our civilian counterparts because our presence means something different. One of the big differences is that military police have jurisdiction wherever they are required as a presence; local and state law enforcement agencies do not have the same privileges outside the city/state they are sworn to serve and protect. We have more at stake politically than our counterparts.

One of the duties the Navy has, as with all the military branches, is helping officiate Captain’s Mast, also known as Article 15. These proceedings will either earn the individual time restricted to their quarters, or if a serious enough offense, time spent in the Brig. The Navy will give a sailor as many chances as necessary to become a viable part of the military, whether they get a reduction in their pay grade or spent time in Navy jail. The same with the Marine Corps and Army – they are all about rehabilitating their soldiers, regardless of how long it takes. They try to retain those that join given the amount of training received as they are a vital part of the military and would like very much to see them succeed. The Air Force is the only branch that will process you out once an airman has gone to the brig.
The Air Force is considered the elite of the military; the amount of training used on each airman is quite costly, and highly specialized. Most of your technical jobs are in the air force to include aircraft, cyber ops, cyber security, drones, etc. They can’t have someone with behavioral and personality issues at the controls of highly technical and expensive equipment. There are no non-technical jobs in the Air Force so they expect their personnel to act in a professional manner, and having someone incarcerated in the brig is not what they consider a good choice for the Air Force.

One of the duties of the Security Department on naval shore facilities is Key, Lock, and Access Control. The purpose of this program is to control access to all buildings on a naval shore facility and maintain key control for reporting purposes. The Security Officer is the Key Control Officer, and a senior Petty Officer, or NCO, or in this case, myself, was the appointed Key Control Custodian and reported directly to the Key Control Officer. For each building, there were typically 4 sets of keys for each building; 2 sets for the building supervisor, 1 set for the Chief Duty Officer for after-hours access, and 1 set to the Security Office, also for after-hours access. There was usually a civilian or military member that could be contacted for after-hours access in the event of an emergency, but if not, the key access could be used.

The reason for this program was because military bases have certain buildings that possessed a certain security level and access to the building needs to be controlled. When I was stationed at Portsmouth Naval Hospital we had to write the Key, Lock, and Access Control Instruction for the new hospital that was being built, which was a large facility. Quite an undertaking on this particular task, but was successful. The Key, Lock, and Access Control program included both keys and keyless entries on certain sections that required an access card.

Management maintains the group and the ideals once they have been put into place. I will be showing where these two have a place in not only the workplace, but can be used in everyday life. Leadership is not just about taking the lead and perhaps being looked at as the number one person on the team; leadership is also about accepting responsibility for those mistakes made and accepting the reprimands and moving on without taking it out on the team. Management doesn’t always have the personal touch that leadership does with a team or group of people. Management is about making sure the job gets done right and on time and perhaps the firing and hiring of personnel.

One part of being in a government agency is that whenever
there is an accident of any kind that agency is required to
conduct an investigation to see if there was any wrong doing
or foul play involved. Most accidents are just that – accidents.
Lately, there have been a few accidents occurring during
training exercises on various military bases throughout the
country. Even if the investigation reveals the fact that
everything was done right, and it was just an accident, it has to
be conducted for the record. Some investigations turn up a
manufacturing flaw, as in the case of the parachute that failed
during a training jump – the investigation exposed the fact that
the stitching was faulty and in turn the parachute failed to
deploy properly, resulting in the death of the individual that
made the jump.

Some investigations may reveal the fact that there was driver
error or pilot error in the event of a crash taking place with
government vehicles and equipment. Once the investigation is
complete and the results have been published to those that
have the need to know, usually there is a military-wide safety
stand-down if there was any unsafe procedures that took
place during the incident. If it is a manufacturing or design
flaw, that will be looked at and the appropriate changes made
so it doesn’t happen again.

In regards to fairness I would like to pose the question to the reader simply of fairness to whom, and does this fairness mean we are somehow magically going to be better or more efficient at what we do? Furthermore, to whom should we be “fair”, or owe this fairness to, and why? Additionally, if we somehow find this fairness or quotas gets in the way of running an efficient and effective law enforcement organization what should we then do? Should we then examine the quotas and numbers to determine if they are somehow the cause, or would such a topic be “off the table” because it is too sensitive for us to even consider as a possible cause? Would we then adjust such quotas up or down dependent upon racial and cultural factors, the same as we used to make our hiring and promotional decisions with in the first place? Does this fairness mean, for example, that we make our hiring, and yes even promotion decisions, based upon being “fair” to the individuals being considered based strictly upon some notion of race or other cultural factor in our search for this so-called fairness factor? If so, this fairness (you could change this word out to say quotas and still be correct) I would argue could in some situations have little to do with qualifications or even necessarily effectiveness in the position being considered (hiring or promotion), but then becomes a focus strictly about numbers and how these “numbers” we came up with somehow trumps all other factors that should be considered. Would, for example, the hiring of a certain amount of any one race or cultural component we consider, make a real difference in how that law enforcement agency responds or reacts to an incident matter, or even be somehow better for the community? What supposed magical number would this be? Would it depend upon the racial or cultural factors from your city, county, or state, or would it perhaps utilize some other process to determine when we have breached that magical number for the hiring and promotional process? In the past, for example, goals have often been set in some jurisdictions for law enforcement hiring to match the racial and cultural make up of such jurisdiction. Once we reach the magic numbers then what are we going to do and how is this ideal number we have set going to affect the law enforcement organizations capabilities in the community?

Admittedly, the questions posed in this blog post are my own personal opinions on the subject and my own ideas and thoughts on these topical issues I think we need to focus on regarding fairness and quotas in the hiring and promotional processes in law enforcement. Sticking our heads in the sand on such and important topic or just accepting the notion that somehow fairness and quotas should trump other important factors in the hiring and promotional processes, such as qualifications or abilities to name just two, just seems to be too important a subject in our profession to just ignore. Answers don’t always come easy, but basing our responses upon political matters and for political expediency will only hurt the ability of the organization to respond to the challenges it faces on hot button topics such as quotes and fairness in the hiring and promotional processes. I would also like to state for the record that I am not opposed to hiring or promotions of anyone based upon race or cultural composition, however if we are using these factors at the expense of effectiveness or efficiency of the law enforcement organization then we need to give second thought to our reasons for such expectations.