Bob Donovan Wants More Milwaukee Police

Or then again, apparently he doesn’t. In case you don’t know Mr. Donovan, he is a Milwaukee alderman who is running for mayor of Milwaukee against incumbent Tom Barrett. As Bruce Murphy at Urban Milwaukee pointed out today, Mr. Donovan likes to play do what I say…not what I do:

In October alderman and mayoral candidate Bob Donovan held an entertainning press conference where he complained that Milwaukee does not have enough police, and that the department has “too many chiefs” and “not enough Indians.”

Minus the cornball rhetoric, there was nothing new about this contention. Donovan complained about a dearth of police in press releases issued in July, in June and in April of this year, not to mention press releases last year with the same message in November, in August, in June and in April.

Never mind the fact that the incumbent mayor has increased the number of police officers in Milwaukee in recent years:

Indeed, Mayor Tom Barrett and the Common Council have four times added more officers in recent years, adding 37 in 2011, 73 in 2012, 20 in 2013, and 50 in 2015, a total of 180 officers.

You would think that Alderman Donovan would applaud and provide solid backing for this expansion of the Milwaukee Police Department. But you woulda thunk wrong:

And how did Donovan vote on these provisions? He voted no on all four budgets funding the additional officers.

So is he winning friends and influencing people?

Donovan’s hollow pontificating, calling for more cops while opposing more spending for this, has left him with absolutely no allies on the Common Council. Not one of his colleagues is likely to support Donovan’s mayoral candidacy…

So there you have it…another candidate for public office…running a fear campaign…without a shred of decency…without a thought to solving the real problems in Milwaukee.