Thread: Police, emergency personnel prepare for Bliss growth

http://www.elpasotimes.com/ci_5108852

Police, emergency personnel prepare for Bliss growth
By Daniel Borunda / El Paso Times
El Paso Times
Article Launched:01/29/2007 12:00:00 AM MST

More emergency calls, traffic increases and even concerns of gang ties in the military are among issues being tackled by El Paso law enforcement and emergency services as they prepare for the growth of Fort Bliss.
Though officials feel the expansion of the Army post is a positive for El Paso, they also said the influx of new troops, some single and some with their families, will require more emergency services.

"The new troops coming in, the homes they will be building, this will increase the requirements to public safety services," said Assistant Fire Chief Donald Marron.

An analysis by the Institute for Policy and Economic Development at the University of Texas at El Paso found that El Paso would need about 102 new police officers and 77 new firefighters with the addition of 12,000 troops to Fort Bliss by 2010.

Fort Bliss will gain about 20,000 soldiers by 2012 due to the Base Realignment and Closure process, or BRAC.

The rapid growth has leaders in the El Paso Police and Fire departments reviewing and updating plans.

Most of the new troops are expected to reside off-post and growth will continue on the city's edges, not just in the Northeast with its traditional ties to Fort Bliss, police and fire officials said.

"We projected out 10 years. We had to adjust because of BRAC," Marron said. "We had a (West Side fire) station we were going to build at Mesa Park and Mesa (Street) near Castellano but we re-thought that."

The Fire Department instead is looking at another station in the Northeast that will be among four new stations to be built in the next five to 10 years, Marron said. New facilities are also planned for the Franklin High School area, near Trans Mountain and Redd roads and a fire station-police regional command center near El Dorado High School on the eastern edge of town.

Construction costs plus personnel will total at least $10 million, which could come from a future bond issue, Marron said.

Mayor John Cook said the city was not looking to build a police force any bigger than had regularly been planned, which is two academies a year, but police officials said the department will have to grow.

"There are times we are stretched thin and we get backlogged on the calls for service in certain areas on certain days," Police Chief Richard Wiles said. "We will definitely have to increase the size of this department."

Wiles said he was awaiting results of a study to determine the needs and costs of additional staff. The department has an estimated cost of $60,000 per officer hired.

Wiles added that the "first priority" is a new police station near Thomason Hospital, which is needed because of overcrowding at the Central Regional Command Center.

Wiles, who grew up in the Northeast in a military family, said his officers already work with military police and there are no expectations that crime will rise with the added troops, though calls for service are expected to leap.

"Our main concern is just the sheer numbers," Wiles said.

But there are some concerns.

Last year, the FBI Office in El Paso said it was monitoring incoming soldiers and their families to determine whether they have ties with the Folk Nation, a loose affiliation of street gangs from Chicago believed to have military links.

The Chicago Sun-Times has reported on gang members in the military after the discovery of photos showing military equipment in Iraq with graffiti from Chicago gangs.

According to an El Paso police document, the Folk Nation already has El Paso ties. A memo written last November described a rise in fights at Hanks High School linked to recruiting efforts by the Latin Kings and Folk gangs. The violence stopped when gang members were expelled.

Related article:
http://www.nysun.com/article/29230?access=499599
March 16, 2006 Edition > Section: National > Printer-Friendly Version

Army Transfers Could Trigger A Gang War
BY JOSH GERSTEIN - Staff Reporter of the Sun
March 16, 2006

Law enforcement authorities fear that the planned relocation of thousands of Army soldiers in Texas could trigger a battle the military has not trained for - a turf war between violent criminal gangs.

Local police and FBI officials said they expect the transfer of between 10,000 and 20,000 troops to Fort Bliss near El Paso, Texas, to bring more members of the Folk Nation gang into contact with a criminal group that is already well-established in the area, Barrio Azteca.

"What we have started looking at is which military units are going to be moving to El Paso," an FBI agent there, Andrea Simmons, said in an interview. "There is a potential for more gang activity, whether it be soldiers, or dependents and families of soldiers."

Ms. Simmons said some gangs actually direct members to join the military to learn how to handle weapons. "The intelligence that we have thus far indicates that they may try to recruit young people who have clean records and encourage them to keep their record clean to get into the military. They would get great weapons training and other types of training and access to weapons and arms, and be able to use that knowledge," she said. "They're taking training that is great and very altruistic and turning around and using it for criminal activity."

Ms. Simmons said Folk Nation, which was founded in Chicago and includes several branches using the name Gangster Disciples, has gained a foothold in the Army. "The Folk Nation has a presence with the military and/or their dependents," she said.

One FBI official, Jeremy Francis, told an El Paso television station, KFOX, that law enforcement had identified at least 80 people with military connections who had committed gang-related crimes. He said about 800 have some allegiance to Folk Nation.

The executive director of the National Major Gangs Task Force, Edward Cohn, said those numbers do not come as a shock. "People are initially surprised that there are gangs in the military, but really it shouldn't be a surprise," he said. "For somebody to believe there are no gangs in the military would be very naive."

Mr. Cohn also said some gang members refine their techniques in the Army. "There is a sophistication there," he said.

An analyst of extremist groups for the Anti-Defamation League, Mark Pitcavage, said the military and the gangs both recruit from the same strata of society.

"A lot of the young people who tend to get into street gangs, they tend to come from socioeconomic backgrounds where joining the military is very economically desirable," he said. The discovery of gang members in the military is "not uncommon at all," he said.

Officials from the Army's Criminal Investigation Division did not return calls seeking comment for this story. However, Army investigators have posted on the Web a PowerPoint presentation telling military commanders how to identify gang tattoos, graffiti, and paraphernalia.

"There is ample evidence that members of the Armed Forces had previous, or have current and active contact with criminal street gangs or extremist groups," the presentation says. It describes incidents, some as far away as Europe, where military members or their children have been involved in gang-related violence.

Mr. Pitcavage said the armed forces generally do a good job of trying to keep out gang members. "If you're in a street gang, the military doesn't want you. Recruiters, they want to see all your tattoos," he said. "Just by virtue of there being so many thousands of people entering the military every year, they can't catch everybody."

A member of the El Paso gang unit, Sergeant Mary Lou Carrillo, said some gang members join the military with the intent of making a clean break. "Some members truly want to change their life and get out of this situation. Then you have others who join with the purposes of continuing in the gang," she said. "That's our problem, unfortunately, a lot of people still having that loyalty to the gang."

The current wave of concern was triggered by plans agreed on last year to move as many as 20,000 troops to West Texas from a variety of locations, including Fort Hood near Killeen, Texas. The base realignment process has always been fraught with political peril, but the suggestion that it could lead to gang violence seems to be a novel one.

Ms. Simmons said the influx could upset the "controlled chaos" created by the dominance of Barrio Azteca in El Paso. Like other gangs, it controls the drug trade, and engages in burglaries, robberies, and shootings.

"Could there be some serious turf wars?" Ms. Simmons asked. "We haven't seen that in El Paso. Is that what may be coming?"

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