By: Diane Benjamin
Hit Play below to hear the entire annual report from Chief Simington.
The department is still having problems hiring officers, maybe because DEI is used in hiring decisions to make the department look more like the community. From this WGLT story: https://www.wglt.org/local-news/2025-03-13/bloomington-police-chief-discusses-illegal-guns-cameras-diversity
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At 57:00 on the video the Chief states he has 85 are patrol officers.
This is a copy of slide he used during the prosenation:
This is the slide included in the packet:
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Of course the second set looks worse, is that why he revised the slide he used?
Simington claimed “shot fired” calls included juveniles target practicing.
More important than the presentation is the Council questions beginning at 1:12:10. Alderman Sheila Montney asked questions at 1:21:05. Her’s pertained to the increase in burglaries and robberies. The Chief mentions roving gangs and organized crime. Montney refers to a WGLT article which states South American gangs exist here. (I don’t know what article that is in)
Training of police officers has been a huge topic this week after incidents in Wheeling and the trial for the guy who killed a Springfield lady. Wheeling Public Comment by an officer, with many other officers behind him, can be seen here: https://youtu.be/EBMiHUySZHg?t=243 The police union has no confidence in the Village leadership. Lack of training is blamed for the Springfield incident. The Wheeling officer states the same.
Simington stated training isn’t a problem in Bloomington.
To me Simington did more blaming citizens for not locking up valuables than he did the criminals. Listen for yourself and decide.
The Police Chief STINKS…and BAD!! We have real crime problems & he prefers to be soft on crime!
And focus on his DEI hires. Could we focus on quality of service provided to the citizens!
He said he wanted to report “good news” of recovering a gun used in a Chicago crime.
I don’t know, but did the department recover the gun and then allow the criminal to walk?
I would call his gun recovery from Chicago BAD NEWS – obviously, the Chicago criminals come down here & run wild because they all know the Police Chief is soft on crime.
Why didn’t he report about his plan to have officers “pull over more white people”?? How is that reducing crime in Bloomington?
We must bring back consequences for committing crimes! There are no consequences…. Therefore crime is rampant! SIMPLE!!
Catch & release does NOT work! The criminals are repeat offenders and the current criminal system enables them to be right back out on the streets.
Also telling the citizens to lock up belongings does not work! Locks are for law abiding citizens. Criminals bust locks…in my case, they kicked in my front door to burglarize my property.
This also ties back to the MAYOR….I am hopeful that the NEW Mayor will be able to influence the police chief to work to actually reduce crime in Bloomington.
Democrats made it impossible to lock up criminals. Evidently Illinois prefers crime.
It’s the Democrat philosophy: the Criminal is the victim. The victim is at fault. Recent example: Karmelo Anthony murdered Austin Metcalf in Frisco TX. He’s being treated as the victim, when he’s actually the criminal.
Bloomington has a history of hit and miss with their police chiefs, this guy is definitely a miss and needs to go.
Hopefully the new mayor will address this?
Look up these criminals who get arrested time and time again. They never pay their fines. Just think how much more money the police departments and cities would have if we made these people accountable. I had a guy down the street from me have over $7000 in fines he will never pay. You would think the next time these criminals go in front of a judge it would be addressed. This state is horrible on all levels for criminal accountability. Sorry if this is a little off topic but it bugs the crap out of me.