Landslide vote decides
new FOP president

By William Kenny
Times Staff Writer

John McNesby will be an old vet by the time he sits down at a table with the new mayor and a new police commissioner to talk about a new labor contract for the city’s 6,500 active police officers.
Last week, the 41-year-old Northeast resident won a three-year term as the next president of the Fraternal Order of Police Lodge 5. McNesby, a longtime lodge board member and aide to outgoing president Bob Eddis, defeated challenger Frank Zampogna in a landslide, earning 76 percent of more than 5,300 votes cast on Oct. 2 at police stations throughout the city.
McNesby, whose father George worked with longtime Lodge 5 president Rich Costello and was once vice president of the state FOP, officially took office on Oct. 9. He has named Eddis, 54, as his chief of staff.
So while Democratic mayoral candidate Michael Nutter, who is heavily favored to win the race, continues to deal with the game challenge of Northeast Republican Al Taubenberger, and while the identity of the person who will succeed Police Commissioner Sylvester Johnson may be revealed only after the new City Hall administration is in place early next year, McNesby and his advisers get to hash out and re-hash their strategy for police contract negotiations.
The union represents 14,500 members including all city police below the rank of deputy commissioner, as well as retired officers. Its current four-year contract expires next June 30.
"I have had no discussions with Mike Nutter," said McNesby, who worked the streets from 1989 though 2002 as a patrol and tactical officer in the East Division and an undercover narcotics investigator.
"(Nutter) doesn’t want to overlook his election and we didn’t want to overlook our election," McNesby said. "On Tuesday night (after the union election), I did receive a congratulatory call from him, which was a real nice gesture."
The union leader hopes to start the arbitration process in December, following the Nov. 6 general election and prior to the next mayor’s January inauguration. Johnson has said that he plans to retire when Mayor John Street leaves office. Public speculation about his successor has already begun and involved the names of several of the department’s young, high-ranking commanders.
The likely next mayor and police union have worked together on labor issues in the past. As a councilman in 1999, Nutter sponsored legislation modifying management provisions of the union’s pension fund.
The union, which under Eddis never seemed hesitant to criticize Street or Johnson on their use of police manpower and resources, is focusing on usual issues including wages, health care and retirement benefits, along with more unique concerns like the police residency requirement and state troopers patrolling the city.
On the health benefits issue, the union plans to push hard for extended coverage for retired officers. Under existing conditions, retirement coverage ceases after five years, according to McNesby.
"Being able to maintain our medical is the priority," the union leader said.
By contrast, McNesby explained, state police have lifetime medical coverage and earn 16 percent more in daily wages than city police do. That disparity is a reason that the union opposes last month’s move by Street and Johnson to allow state police to assist local cops on patrols in high-crime areas.
So far, just five state troopers have been assigned to city patrols, according to the union leaders.
"One is too many. Once you let one in, it opens the door," McNesby said. "They want to take over the expressways in the city and re-deploy those (city) officers. But with state troopers, if they exit the highway, then they’re in the neighborhoods and it becomes a safety issue. They don’t know where they’re at."
The union also doesn’t like that its members must live in the city, while state police can live in the suburbs.
Lifting the residency rule "is something we’ve always been fighting for, but this is going to make our case a little stronger," McNesby said.
The changing demographics of the department and what they describe as declining interest among potential recruits could also help their case.
More than 50 percent of the department has less than 10 years on the job as the city’s deferred retirement program (DROP) continues to remove large numbers of veteran officers from service. Under DROP, city employees are offered financial incentives in exchange for agreeing to retire four years from the date of their enrollment. The program is intended to help the city reduce its labor costs.
"People are now retiring with two hundred- and three hundred-thousand dollars in their pockets, which was unheard of years ago," McNesby said.
Meanwhile, recruiting replacement cops has become more and more of a struggle.
"When I took the test (in 1989), there were twenty thousand people," McNesby said. "For the last test, I drove by Central High where they were giving it and there were seventeen hundred."
Union leaders recognize that the job may not be as attractive to recruits as it once was considering the increase in gun violence throughout the city in recent years. Even police officers seem to have targets on their backs, these days.
Just two weeks ago, rookie officer Richard Decoatsworth was shot in the face and shoulder by a motorist that he had stopped for a traffic violation in West Philadelphia. Decoatsworth survived the shotgun blast and spent a week in the hospital, where he underwent reconstructive surgery.
Police from around the city converged upon the area of 52nd and Market streets when the "officer down" call went out. A group of officers from Port Richmond tracked down the alleged gunman in a back yard nearby.
While McNesby doesn’t think a handful of state police will be able to change the violent culture that leads to police and civilian shootings, he holds firm to the notion that better deployment is the answer.
"We can put more officers on the street, but it’s a matter of where they are," he said. "It’s deployment and scheduling."
The union leader believes that it’s time for an overhaul in the department’s rotating shift set-up. Certain officers prefer day work, while others prefer working at night. They should be allowed to remain in preferred shifts perpetually, he says.
"We have sixty-six hundred police officers on the street. We can do the job," McNesby said.
He also thinks that the patrol bureau is sorely short on commanders.
"You have to look at promotions. Sometimes you have one lieutenant covering two or three districts," the union president said.
Street and Johnson reportedly are planning to grant as many as 225 promotions involving ranks from detective to captain in the next few months. Nutter, however, has been quoted in opposition to the promotions, arguing that they should be left to the new mayor and commissioner. ••
Reporter William Kenny can be reached at 215-354-3031 or bkenny@phillynews.com