Leonie Sherman's Statement on the Negative Campaigning Aimed at Her

Negative Campaigning aimed at Leonie


As a Safety Skills teacher in Santa Cruz schools for the past seven years, I’ve worked well with our Police Department. As a Council member, I look forward to maintaining a productive and positive relationship with the department.

When a Deputy Chief of the City Police Department publicly discredits a candidate in a City Council race — any candidate — the department is exposed to the charge of influencing the outcome of an election. That undermines public confidence in this City’s ability to hold a free and fair election.

No question that members of the police department enjoy the same right to express themselves as freely and to vote as freely as anyone else, but I believe our police department should stay out of the electoral process. A blatant attempt by a police spokesman at character assassination of a candidate on the eve of an election is a poor judgment that reflects badly on the department. All of us rely on our police men and women to have the ability to make sound judgments about nuanced matters: about probable cause or the use of force or whether to arrest, etc. It’s a difficult job, and no one is perfect, but having a senior officer make outlandish judgments on the TV News shakes public trust in that ability.

http://leoniesherman.com/uncategorized/negative-campaigning-aimed-at-leonie

Leonie Sherman for City Council
http://leoniesherman.com/
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Friends-of-Leonie-Sherman-2014/234646793409408