In response to recent “negative” news reports, the Block by Block program has increased oversight and accountability of their security ambassadors.
“I have also started to beef up the audits that we do,” Shea Gibson, the program’s managing director, told the Public Safety Commission on Monday night. “So we do audits on our team for quality control purposes, of course. So we’ll conduct two audits per ambassador per shift, just to make sure that they’re on task and doing the things that they’re supposed to be doing.”
According to their January data, the security ambassadors are having to deal with the most homeless people on the city’s East Side, where they reported almost double the amount of contacts (221) as the Mid-City and West sides.
There were 1,200 business contacts made on the East Side, 223 in Mid-City and 401 on the West Side.
The security kiosk at WeHo Park is by far the busiest, with 72 contacts made there last month.That’s a surprisingly small number considering the amount of resources it takes to set up and staff each kiosk. Other locations such as the Ramada and “Sunset” reported a mere 12 and 9 contacts respectively for the entire month.
It generally takes between 5 and 15 minutes for the security ambassadors to respond to calls, the agency reports.
I remember summer camp counselors that were better equipped for this type of task. They were also highly responsible and character builders not former felons.
I take the trolley to go out on weekend nights. There are usually three security ambassadors on the trolley, sitting at the front and talking to one another. That seems like a profound waste of resources. Isn’t the idea to have security ambassadors on foot on our streets?
i want to know why there is not a security ambassador at the Starbucks on the corner of Robertson and Santa Monica Blvd early in the morning. The area outside Starbucks is overrun with homeless people who seem to have either drug addictions and or mental health issues, yet there isn’t anyone staffing the kiosk until much later in the day when they seem to disperse. Shouldn’t there be ambassadors there early in the morning to protect us? Santa Monica Blvd looks like a zombie apocalypse during the early morning hours with the number of frightening homeless addicts screaming and… Read more »
Great point, they should be there early and I have had a couple run ins where I have had to call the Sheriffs in the early hours, so guess cutting the Sherrifs and replacing them with Block, isn’t quite working out so well for our demented City Council.
Jonathan Hong Dowling You are 100% correct. This is an issue of drug addiction, given our open borders to import fentanyl from China to the southern border. Killing our kids. And the newer, more powerful meth. The homeless are not homeless because of an economic issue, that’s just a convenient trope for the woke and progressives. It is drug addiction which leads to mental health and physical health problems. Ambassadors cannot do sh*t, as well as the Sheriff. Both are handcuffed by Newsom and the West Hollywood. City Counsel cares more about the few (which they don’t have a solution)… Read more »
Fake news. Go back to Next Door or Truth Social, take crazy talk some place else. You spout all the talking point of fox news, which all know now in the Fake News channel. #BidenWon I’ve spoken to a few security ambassadors and I asked them what their priorities are, all of them have said it’s the businesses along Santa Monica Blvd. They don’t patrol the blocks where the residents live, they’re only dispatched to residential areas if called. Basically the city has a security force to protect the businesses of the city, not the tax paying, voting citizens. They… Read more »
These Ambassadors are NOT strategic thinkers. They appear to be reactive and based on their leader Shawn, that leaves much to be desired.🙄
They are useless. Sorry, but they serve no purpose.
I support this safety ambassador program
.
you may be the only one.
Why does the City of West Hollywood, after numerous inquiries, refuse to provide the answer to this question:
Are any members of the city council or administrative bureaucrats, past and present, receiving finders fees or commissions on the amount of money the city is paying for the BBB services?
Do you have any reason to think that this may be the case?
They are elected representatives, why would you need a reason to have them acknowledge that they aren’t corrupt?
Enough inquiries – myself, a friend, and a lawyer – to certainly build a case for future public trust. Is the city clerk and the city attorney along with the city manager just afraid to say that it’s probably Shyne! If so, they all three would be put on the woke it list.
I don’t “audit” my employees. I provide proper leadership after giving clear directions and expectations, then I hold them accountable. None of this is the fault of the individual ambassadors. It remains a program without purpose and that places Gibson in an untenable position, as well. The city council rushed an eleventh-hour, back-of-the-napkin program through an exhausted meeting without much thought, other than to take a stab at residents who clearly favor a solid LASD presence in the face of increasing crime and national gun violence. See Michigan State University, and all-too-many more across the nation. Sadly, naivete rules West… Read more »
The Michigan State shooter had a prior felony gun charge. Therefore, he had illegal possession of a gun. He would have likely been in prison were it not for a progressive prosecutor who dismissed his gun charge.
The prosecutor stated the felony enhancement would lead to dramatic racial inequity.
It’s such a stupid program. They do nothing. And everyone knows it.
The morons driving the “defund the police” effort…….are accelerating the decline of our cities.
Here’s a free tip……the people paying the overwhelming majority of the taxes in LA……..are leaving. Enjoy your new Baltimore, Detroit and Atlanta (it’s not pretty).
The “defund the police” jerks at City Hall are to blame for this fiasco.
I say “refund the police” and get rid of Erickson, Byers, and deplorable Shyne.
I say I agree with you.
And I agree as well.
Don’t defund the police, abolish them completely.
This is a program looking for a purpose.
The kiosks were oversold from the start and need to be re-visited. I suspect the biggest problem for Block by Block is that the CIty Council’s decision to just pick a number and add thirty new BBB employees did not give Block by Block the time or opportunity to hire the best people and provide them with adequate training. Block by Block proved its’ value on the Eastside but the expansion across the City has been rocky. Unfortunately the focus of the City Council majority in regard to law enforcement has been pandering to political agendas and not what makes… Read more »
I cringed when I watched Sepi do the back-of-the-napkin math as the hour approached midnight at that council meeting. There was no thought, no plan, no analysis. It was purely political theatre, and not award-winning theatre at that.
What were the “Contacts” for? How many required LASD to respond?
If they require a twice a shift visit to check that each person is actually working I am not sure that the right people are in the position. Or, for that matter, supervising.