Curbing Chicago Street siege needs Olympian effort

As President Barack Obama was smarting from a dozen stitches after an errant basketball elbow to the mouth, there was a real foul being committed here on the home front.

Or, should I say, yet another one.

About 6 miles down the lake shore from Mr. Obama's Kenwood home, a Chicago policeman was gunned down along with a former housing cop.

The incident was such a ho-hum occurrence in Chicago that it seemed to rile only the police, the victims' family members and a politician or two.

I imagine that the president's split lip was discussed at more dinner tables coast-to-coast over the weekend than the terribly upsetting death of Officer Michael Flisk and ex-Chicago Housing Authority officer Stephen Peters.

Perhaps early in this season when it is more blessed to give than to receive, Mr. Obama ought to return home to give help against the violence at least before he expects to receive votes in his re-election bid.

Flisk is the sixth Chicago police officer to die this year and the second in a week. Across the country this year, 147 men and women in blue have died. That number of police officer fatalities has increased almost 50 percent compared to last year. If that doesn't warrant a presidential emergency declaration, I don't know what would.

The cause of this epidemic of law enforcement killings is not complicated.

It's numbers.

Police departments of all sizes, in all states and at all levels of government are being squeezed below the level of safe operation. The result is that the cops are outmanned.

In Chicago, the code for this police aberration is “10-99.” The single-person squad car.

Officer Flisk, a crime scene evidence technician, was working alone last Friday when somebody ambushed him and ended his life.

He shouldn't have been working alone and he shouldn't have died without a partner to help defend him against whoever came at him.

I don't know what went down when Flisk and Mr. Peters, who had reported a burglary, were shot and killed. I do know that Flisk and the CPD's other evidence techs or ETs may be the most vulnerable sworn officers on the force. They usually work alone and show up to process crime scenes after the emergency is over but people are still angry.

They go about their business and they are alone.

In that alley near 8100 S. Manistee, Officer Flisk, 46 and a father of four, was an easy target.

In violent Chicago, no uniformed police officer should patrol, investigate, process or take a coffee break alone.

But the numbers are not on their side. Despite city hall and police brass continuing to insist that there are 13,500 officers in Chicago as if they are all out there patrolling at one time it just isn't true. The police department hasn't been fully staffed in decades and right now is more than 2,000 sworn officers shy.

Complicating matters, between furloughs, retirements, discipline cases, desk jobs, medical leaves and budget cuts, there are only 3,000 or 4,000 cops on city streets at any one time.

That means there is incredible pressure on those who are working regular shifts to handle an increasing number of emergency calls. Police district supervisors and 911 call center managers keep their eye on one ball: RAP. Radio Assignments Pending.

The number of RAPs on busy weekend nights can be alarmingly high, indicating that there are too few patrol cars to handle all the calls for help. When the force is especially busy, it is not unusual for victims of nonviolent crime to wait for hours before police respond.

That is not the fault of officers. They don't slash budgets and cut personnel. The politicians and the superintendent do that.

Chicago needs more police officers. A lot more.

And it goes all the way to the White House, which has set a tone for law enforcement: despite the talk, other things are more important. Paving roads, patching bridges, saving GM, fixing banks, etc...

But we know the president is not too busy to drop everything and jet off to a distant land to help out Chicago. He did it last year when the 2016 Olympics were at stake and that was an overseas trip.

Despite Mr. Obama's personal lobbying for the Olympics, Chicago lost the 2016 games to Rio de Janeiro. That is the same Rio where crime is also out of control and 35 people have died this month during a bloody drug war.

But in Rio, the coming Olympics seem to be strong motivation for regaining control. On Friday, Brazil's president ordered 800 soldiers into violence-strafed neighborhoods. There are tanks and armored personnel carriers on the streets.

At least it looks serious, prompting one Rio observer to call it an “Urban Vietnam.”

Sometimes though, it takes a stiff upper lip to deal with adversity.

And with 12 stitches in his, Obama has a head start.

• Chuck Goudie, whose column appears each Monday, is the chief investigative reporter at ABC 7 News in Chicago. The views in this column are his own and not those of WLS-TV. He can be reached by email at chuckgoudie@gmail.com and followed at twitter.com/ChuckGoudie.