Quote:
Originally Posted by Spidey
Meme, I really find it hard to believe that you care about the safety of the officers, but are more frustrated that you are seeing SOME officers not wearing the vest when you are basically "forced" to for your work.
Maybe generalizing wasn't the best word to use... Maybe ignorance then? The first post you made, none of the RCMP officers in your post were even on the street. Unless you didn't know the different outfits between the city police and RCMP? Most people interchange RCMP and VPD so it happens.
Like I said before, there are a lot of factors to consider and there is more to those pictures. The problem with people and the media is that they look at pictures and videos, and pick parts of it to focus their attention on and try to fill in the blanks rather than investigate the facts. I personally have never seen officers jump on on the street without their vest on. I am not saying it doesn't happen, but you are making it sound like it happens all the time. Your pictures don't illustrate anything because they don't even show the RCMP officers on the street. As I mentioned in an earlier post, there are usually multiple officers working a traffic op. The one that sees the offence (probably not wearing a vest), and the one that conducts the stop (probably wearing a vest).
With respect to the city Police forces, you are going to have to ask them about detachment policies regarding traffic stops and wearing vests. I doubt they have to wear a vest when doing a routine traffic stop as I have never seen them wear one, and if it was required, you would see at least a few of them wearing them, but I haven't seen any. I have sent a message to a friend of mine who is VPD and am awaiting his reply.
If it was mandatory, I am sure officers would wear it. You have no idea how officers get reamed out for breaking the pettiest of policies, so I am sure this wouldn't have gone unnoticed for this long.
Lastly, IMO, the average driver won't even notice a cop wearing a vest. Traffic ops aren't only done for speeding. As some of you know (the hard way), it is one to catch distracted drivers. Distracted drivers will never see you. I have walked up to the driver's side window of a car, and the driver never saw me.. had their head down looking at their phone.
PS. you are right regarding my policy/regulation comment.
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No, you are absolutely wrong in your view of me. I am an advocate for safety and an advocate for the protection of human life. So I genuinely do care for the safety of everyone.
If I were not forced to wear a safety vest I would likely wear it anyway, much like how I wear fire proof carhartts and safety glasses whenever I am out on site.
Also the pictures posted here have nothing to do with my argument, and they are certainly not my pictures. I am speaking from countless personal experiences witnessing officers stepping into traffic to flag a car to pull over.
^THAT specific scenario is when I would like to see an officer wearing their high Vis.
I don't care about routine stops when they pull someone over in their car and then block with the vehicle and stuff like that. Although I certainly do not believe that it is a bad thing for them to wear it at that point either.
But I just cannot see the logic, you setup a radar trap, you know you will need to flag cars to stop and possibly get in front of them to direct them over, why the hell wouldn't you put on your high vis as part of your setup.
In my industry we do whats called an FLHA before we start any task. This is a "Field Level Hazard Assessment", it takes litterally 2 minutes, and it just makes you go through the process of thinking, and quickly writing down the hazards of the job you are about to do, and what steps you can take to mitigate the danger. Maybe this would be a good thing for officers to do before they embark on their task.
Or another thing we do, is we develop SWP (safe work plan), for high risk practices, or common tasks which may have dangers to them.
I am not using the fact that I am forced to wear a vest or the fact that I do these safety things for any reason. I do and advocate my workers to do these things because if it even prevents one single injury or fatality during my career it would be worth it to me.
I am unfortunate enough to have been on a job site and witnessed a fellow tradesperson lose his life. It is an experience I think about almost daily, and especially so when I am out on site. I would never want anyone to ever have to see or go through something like that.
TL;DR: My opinion on this matter GENUINELY comes from a position of wanting to promote safety.