You want to be an a mad Here we go Friday Morning Scott Flunds Show, seven hundred WLW. Before we get into the fun stuff on Friday Morning's laid dude. We got business to take care of, including this. The City of Cincinnati's extending its contract with the law firm here their independent Council Frost Brown Todd to review the effectiveness of leadership within the Cincinnati Police Department of what.
You may recall that Chief Terry Thiji was suspended, not fired, suspended back in October, and so they're going to do an investigation. The city is and I guess we have more investigating because the contrast was extended till the twenty eighth. Of course that's tomorrow. They said we still need more time, so we're going to give you another month. And the problem with this is its costing taxpayer is more. The
third round, I guess is on the house. It was nine thousand dollars to the extended play to tomorrow, and so you're talking close to fifty grand. What's all said and done, and again we have the issue here is you fired someone in chief, Terry Thiji, and now you need months to figure out why you fired her in the first place. FOP President Ken Kobra, Welcome to the show.
How are you, brother, Hey Scott, Thanks for having me.
Yeah, so forty nine k Diji's still on paid administrative leave. She's still getting paid her two hundred and three thousand dollars salary. I don't know if Henny got a bump. I'd imagine he was as interim chief. This is costing a ton of money.
Sure it is. Not only is it costing the taxpayers a lot of money, there's a lot of uncertainty right now in the police department. It's something that the men and women of this department are owed to know who's going to be in charge of this place and who's going to be in charge permanently. And the longer they drag it along, the more uncertain it is of what's really going on.
And at what point does the investigation stop being to search for answers and clause and start being a way to keep Fiji and Limbo indefinitely. I mean, if it were clear cut, and typically when you get fired four clause there's something that triggers that in your contracts. It's obvious, and yet it's taking October November December January. We've got five months of investigation and they still can't find out why. What the hell's taken us along?
Yeah, that's that's a million dollar question. You think that if you had just caused to fire somebody, you would be so blatantly obvious to everybody to see that this is why this is happening, and it's just not there. They can't find anything. That's that's the whole problem with this. It's nothing but a big scam to get rid of her, and now they don't know what to do.
Does this undermine Adam Henny at this point? Because from those I talked to outside of you, he seems like a good guy. He's certainly qualified to be chief of the City of Cincinnati. But this whole thing, as you mentioned you alluded to Ken, it doesn't make his job easier. There's only so much he can do because he's in orm he doesn't have the full title. Yet it undermines his authority and his ability to function, and therefore it undermines the mission of cpd.
Oh without a doubt, you know, because like I said, with him being just an interim, you're right, there's there's permanent decisions that typically aren't made when you have an interim chief. You know, it's not fair to him what's going on. It's not fair to Chief SIGI to be sitting at home going, well, what are they going to do? You know, is today the day that they're gonna fire me?
You know what is today to day that there's gonna be some kind of conclusion And clearly that's not gonna be the case because they've extended this yet another month.
Well, I know, Terry, you haven't spoken since she was fired, and she's you know, obviously because that's the advice and counsel. I get that whole thing, but I don't know for me or anyone listening. You're like, Okay, I get two hundred and three thousand dollars in full benefits and I don't have to do anything. But at the end of the day, you want some closure.
Well, sure, you know, and she's she's already done, you know, her full career. You came back after she retired, so it's not like this is about money for her. It's not like it's about you know, I'm you know, I've got to got to be able to feed my family. Yeah, you know, this is something that she came back because she felt driven to lead this department, and now it's just everything's up in limbo and it's just not fair.
It's not how you treat somebody that's spent as many years that she has, much less anybody you know that's employed someplace. But unfortunately that's where we're at.
All right, Well, they put her on leave before they even hired a law firm to investigator. From your perspective, what does that say about whether this is really ever about due process?
Well, we know that it's not. You know, they for whatever reason, they decided they were going to get rid of her, just like they did Michael Washington, and now they're in in a spot where it's going to end up costing them. And that's just we knew all along that this wasn't about her effectiveness. This was they wanted to go in a different direction, and instead of doing things the right way, you know, they fumbled, unfortunately, like they did many times before.
The tipping point was and this happened right after the Fountain Square shooting and the individual who shot fired those weapons at City Bird turns out he's free now because it was ruled self defense. Because the two individuals inside both under age and both in under disability. Mean they shouldn't have a gun fired at him from inside city? Bird Chicken, how's that on the chief?
Exactly? It's not. You know, we still see that there's there's still violence going on in this city. There's only so much that the chief can do, There's only so much that every uniform police officer can do. But to try to put your crime stolely at the feet of her is just not fair.
We know Ken Cober that share Long city manager sent Chief DG an email in August that essentially ordered her to clear all communications through the mayor's officeer go back that far that started in August? Does the FLP do you guys believe this investigation can truly be independent given that context?
Now it's not. I mean it's in one investigation. I mean you can go and look at her personnel file and there's absolutely no discipline. And you would think if if she was doing things that were so egregious that they need to terminate her, you would think that there would be at least some kind of paper trail other than you know, one communication saying hey, everything needs to get through me. That doesn't make any sense.
This is an indictment of Adam Henny, the now interim chief, But he was a command officer who signed a citation that downtown brawl case the mayor's request. I mean, let's they say that didn't happen, but let's just call it
what it was. You need to charge a white guy in this thing because of propriety, even though Chief now Chief Henny wasn't on the scene and he took he found the sword for his officers, which I think endears him to beat cops for sure, saying hey, listen, he's the guy who did this knowing he shouldn't have done it. But what does that tell you? Though not about Adam Henny, but what does that tell you about who the administration trusts and why.
Yeah, I know Adam was certainly put in a bad position that he had to make a decision. He stuck up first trips, which I certainly appreciate, but he certainly does call into some questions of how the timing and things happen afterwards.
Yeah, the comments that came out here when they appointed Frost, Brown and Todd to extend this now for the third time in order to find out why they fired Chief Thiji back in October, they fired her or suspend her, I should say, fired her, and now they're looking for reasons why, and it's taking five months to do this. The quote was I read with the broader goals and objectives of the city administration, whether she further those that
brought her goals? Is that just them? It sounded to me like when I read that quote, they're essentially asking whether she was loyal enough to the may or, not about law and order and the constitution and or swore an oath, but loyalty to the administration. And that should ever, should that ever be grounds for firing a police chief.
No, it shouldn't. And this is where Issue five comes into play. Deal where the chief only has so much perfection, and that's the problem. It's become a politicized position where if you don't get along with the people at city Hall, even if you're doing the right thing, it's just something they don't like, you know, then you're going to end up facing these consequences. And that's that's that's why we've had so many different chiefs over the last ten twelve years. Now.
Issue five was sold to the voters like an accountability measure, but take us through that. For those who may not recall what Issue fives is, how it plays in here, describe that.
You know, prior to it was like twenty ten. You know, the police chief and the fire chief as well. They were hired and then they were they stayed in the collective bargaining unit, so they were protected by our contract. Issue five took that away to where they could hire anybody from outside the department if they wish, and they would have no collective bargaining protection, which is why it then became such a politicized position, because you're going to do what I want you to do, or I'm going
to fire you. And we've seen in every major city around this country the deal deals with the same thing. They have a new police chief every couple of years because you know, the honeymoon will wear off, and then all of a sudden, the chief does something that's city hall or city manager whoever doesn't like, and then they get rid of them. And it's like that in every city in this country.
Unfortunately, Yeah, Ken Cober as president of the since the FOP, Queen City Lodge and the City of Cincinnats extending their contract with Frost Brown Todd here as their independent council into looking why they fired Chief Terry Thigi in October and their job is to find the reason why they fired her in October. And here we are now headed into March. So is this about politics? One hundred percent?
And it's costing the text. There's a hell of a lot of money too, because you're still paying DIJI, and you're paying Heny, and you're paying the law office the law firm to investigate this. And if it was a clear cut case of cause for getting fired for cause, the reason why why has it taken five months? A
normal person would ask. So that's Issue five you proposed, I believe it was you proposed to those basically the many things you said you could do right, repeal Issue five, let the chief or Terry Thiej or Adam Hunte whoe ever, work independently, or elect a new mayor. So which is the most viable option, the easiest path here?
Well, I think the one, the path that is going to be the most permanent is to do something with Issue five. That way, regardless of who the mayor is, regardless of who the police chief is, they're going to have that protection. That's what ultimately needs to be done. It's going to be a heavy lift. We'll see how it works out, but that's ultimately what needs to be done if the people in this city want to have a police chief that can make decisions based off of safety not politics.
Yeah. Yeah, an issue five. I mean it was sold to us as an accountability measure, and I believe it was your predecessor way back in the day FP president Keith Fangman, who said it would do just what it's doing today. I mean that was back in two thousand, I believe two thousand and one and two somewhere around there. So twenty five years later, a quarter century later, he was absolutely right.
Yeah, without a doubt. I mean, we all all predicted that this was going to happen, and well here we are ken the department.
I think we're still one hundred and fifty officers short. Has that number changed? It all? Correct me on that one if I'm wrong. But I mean, you got a lame duck chief, You've got a chief and interim, You've got morale issues, you got recruitment issues. This can't be helping retain or attract officers.
No, it's not. You still have officers that are that are leaving every day. That just said I've had enough, I've got my twenty five years and I'm gonna leave. I'm not staying and do an extra We are still we just didn't just graduate a class of fifty four, So that's certainly is help. But in the end, like I said, every week we have more people leaving, so
it certainly continues to be a challenge. We've got a class that's supposed to start the end of April, but it's still we're going to be significantly impacted by personnel shortage for years to come.
Yeah, And Kaji's attorney said, I looked at her jacket. She's thirty five years on the job, and she hasn't had a significant negative performance review in thirty five years, And that just further under reminds us. Are they just sitting back I know you probably haven't talked to her counsel or her, but are they just sitting back on and going, hey, listen, we're just gonna wind up settling and the city is going to have to pay all of a lot of money.
That's what's going to happen, right, Yeah, I mean that's that's ultimately what's going to happen because anybody's going to look at this and see that this person's had a stellar career. You know, you have no negative discipline nothing, you know, so anybody can look at you have to be an attorney to look at this and see that there's something more going on here and it has nothing to do with performance.
Yeah. So if the investigation could includes they recommend termination, what options does the FOP have to challenge that outcome? Presuming you you're involved in this center, are you prepared to see that?
Well, Unfortunately, because of issue five, Chief Figi's not in our bargaining in it. So any action that she would take she would be doing on her own behalf.
Yeah, which is why she's hired outside council. Right If people go, well the FOPL bit yor no, they can't because of again, because of issue five. Hopefully we can get that repeal. Is there is there a momentum within council to do that or I can imagine that share along and up want to do that, But what about council.
I don't know. I mean, I've talked to some council members that seem to certainly willing to entertain it. So we'll see here in the coming months of whether this costiny traction or not.
Have you spoken to FOP council and just you know, maybe what's twisted in the wind out there, and how much is this going to cost us? Do we have any idea of the scope of the millions of dollars to pay Thigi off to design a non disclosure agreement and go away.
Yeah, it could be a very very significant amount of money. Yeah, and that's that's on the city. They're somethings that created this mess. You know. I just hope whatever whatever agreement, if they do come to one that both sides can live with and we can move on, because that's ultimately what this police department needs.
I know. Well, it depends what crime numbers you look at right now. We've had a very very cold winter, for sure, it tends to scare away the street riff raff if you will. But we had high profile shooting on New Year's Day of that young girl. We've had a streak of homicides and the l like too. I
didn't look today where we're pacing. But again, if we start to see another uptick this summer this spring as the weather warms up and people go outside and hang out, and you know we're gonna have what a couple of weeks away from the time change, we always see a ruot rising crime alongside that too. If the numbers are where they were this time last year or even higher, what does that say about this decision to get rid of Thiji. I mean, it's not an indictment of Adam
Henney at all. But are we in a better place with Adam Henny than were Terry?
And that's the question. You know, I don't know what the crime stats are going to show up to see what kind of impact changes that he has made have on crime. We'll see hopefully they're positive ones. But I mean, ultimately, you can't you can't blame Chief Figi and you certainly can't blame Chief Henny, Yeah, for the problems with crime.
What you can do is blame the people in society that don't know how to behave that that don't value life, that decide where we're just going to pick up a gun to shoot somebody because you said something mean to me. Until any of that changes for the better, we're going to likely see some of the exact same things regardless of who's in charge of the Police Department.
It's kind of like the Bengals, isn't it canon that it doesn't matter with the head coaches. You can pick back George Alis or the second coming of Jag or Hoover in your case. And if your hands are tied by the administration and it's all political, you really don't have any chance here, No.
Without a doubt. And if you remember, I think the last press conference that Chief Fiji did, some of her closing remarks, we're talking about how the expectation is for Since Saint police officers to go out and enforce low level crimes. That way we can make this city a safer place. And then two days later she's on administrative leaf.
So I know there's certainly a good group of officers that certainly believe that this was a direct result of coming out and saying we're going to start enforcing low level walls that maybe we haven't enforced in the past, and that was something that city hauled didn't like, because we're going to have officers go out and be proactive and try to reduce crime. Yeah, well there's a copy punch for that. And of course now she's on administrative leaf.
Now finally, Ken Cober, I won't keep you longer. What do you think this wraps up? I mean, how much longer can they keep extending? It's a third time to extended this deal with the law firm investigating why they fired Fiji back in October? Is this going to go six months and a year? Do they just simply want to drag this out till we forget help me out here.
I'm telling you, I was surprised myself when I heard yesterday that they ended this. You know, I guess from her perspective, you're being paid yo to sit at home. But I also understand it's like, look, she wants some finality to this. I want to let's move on. Let's see what's going to happen. I don't know, I don't know how long they drag it out. But every month that they drag it out, they're costing the taxpayers more and more money, right, and it's just an irresponsible thing
to do. But at this point it's it's certainly not surprising.
Well, I don't know. Maybe reparations will fix.
This, you never know. Maybe maybe No, that's the chiefs of that.
I'll get into that a little bit later on. That was a proposal from jan Deshellaman cured. I'll try to get her on the show next week if she wants five million reparations for the way people have colored retreated in Cincinnati. Legitimate concern for sure, because it's true, but there's reparations to fix things. You can make a case it makes it worse. We'll get that a little bit
later on in the show. Ken Cober, President the FOP, thanks for jumping on this morning, brother, Be well and have a great weekend.
Thanks you, Misch. I appreciate it.
Yeah, there you go, Ken, And a lot of questions if you're a city taxpayer, going, yeah, well, what about five months to figure this out? Clearly they fired her, got rid of her, put her and leave whatever it is, and we'll try to find something. Yeah, you know what she did in nineteen eighty three, she tore off a mattress tags that don't remove this tag on her pedalty the law that you're fired. I thought it's gonna come down to Scott's Loan show, News on the way in
just minutes and Will Gantz, our guy from ABC. We've got theater, we've got a reboot, we got movies out, I should say, and we also have a reboot of Scrubs if you're into that show. It's taken what sixteen years I believe to bring this thing back. We'll find out what took so long, or'll find out why we're bringing it back from Will. He's next after news on seven hundred WLW Scott Slunsha