Free Talk Live

"nstead of declaring bankruptcy, Maywood officials decided to outsource all city functions. The Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department will patrol the streets, while the neighboring city of Bell will cover other city functions, such as staffing City Hall.

Maywood already relies on contract workers and outsources many city services. The director of parks and recreation, for instance, is a contractor, and the city's lights, landscaping and street sweeping are handled by private companies. Los Angeles County maintains the library and fire department."

VOLUSIA COUNTY, Fla. (WOFL FOX 35) - In a surprise move Monday night the city of Oak Hill eliminated its entire police department.

The police chief and a few officers were under scrutiny for alleged illegal and odd behavior. The city council was so fed up they simply wiped out the entire department.

"We're going to have our own tank." That's what Keene, N.H., Mayor Kendall Lane whispered to Councilman Mitch Greenwood during a December city council meeting.
It's not quite a tank. But the quaint town of 23,000 -- scene of just two murders since 1999 -- had just accepted a $285,933 grant from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security to purchase a Bearcat, an eight-ton armored personnel vehicle made by Lenco Industries Inc.
But those plans are on hold for now, thanks to a backlash from feisty residents.

One small-town Minnesota school district is taking a unique approach to keeping students safe: The police are moving in. In Jordan, south of Minneapolis, officials looking at school security after the massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut decided the police would set up satellite offices in public schools. Officers will conduct some of their daily work from the schools, including taking calls and filling out paperwork, while still going out into the community to patrol or respond to emergencies.

In Gurgaon, economic growth is often the product of a private sector improvising to overcome the inadequacies of the government. To compensate for electricity blackouts, Gurgaon’s companies and real estate developers operate massive diesel generators capable of powering small towns. No water? Drill private borewells. No public transportation? Companies employ hundreds of private buses and taxis. Worried about crime? Gurgaon has almost four times as many private security guards as police officers.

JPMorgan Chase donated an unprecedented $4.6 million to the New York City Police Foundation, in the form of 1,000 new patrol car laptops, security monitoring software in the NYPD’s main data center, other technology resources, and funding. The gift was the largest in the history of the foundation and will enable the New York City Police Department to strengthen security in the Big Apple.

According to an Albany City Council member, the Albany Police Department has decided to back out of an agreement with Berkeley Police Department and UCPD to purchase an armored vehicle through a federal grant.

The $170,000 federal grant to purchase a Lenco BearCat will come from the Urban Areas Security Initiative, a Department of Homeland Security nonprofit organization that is intended to financially support agencies that are at high risk of a terrorist attack with “security enhancements.”...

Seaside Heights police department hit with new excessive force lawsuit. Story also covers several out of court settlements that the town tried to hide but were dug up by John Paff, chairman of the New Jersey Libertarian Party's Open Government Advocacy Project,

British entrepreneur Antony Sharp is starting a company which will provide armed escorts to ships transiting through the pirate infested Gulf of Aden. He hopes his company, Typhon [sic], will fill in the large security hole left by state-run navies.