"Customer Survey" DOA

Since those other two "official" blogs won't exchange links with us, we don't link to them directly. But here's what J-Fed posted yesterday after the shit hit the fan:

• The suggestion that the Department is undertaking a Customer Satisfaction Survey that would involve officers handing out cards to individuals when they respond to incidents is totally inaccurate.

  The Department has long partnered with academic institutions regarding research and other initiatives designed to improve the Department. When one of our academic partners recently proposed a “Customer Satisfaction Survey,” I immediately rejected the idea. This occurred over three weeks ago…well before the article appeared. In fact, in a meeting with Union officials as recently as last week, I mentioned that the Department would not be undertaking any effort such as this. I also understand the reaction that individuals have had to the survey; some of the same concerns prompted me to reject the notion of undertaking one.

  My concern has always been for the men and women of our department; through an increased emphasis on training, equipment and leadership, I believe that we are moving forward on improving the Department together.

Look at the needle go!!! Of course, this begs the question - WHY WAS THE SURVEY STILL UP AS AN ACTIVE WEB PAGE UNTIL YESTERDAY WHEN THE NEWSLETTER AND THE SCC BLOG BROKE THE STORY? We all know why - the Department had every intention of moving forward with the survey if negative attention was low enough. It wasn't.

Unfortunately, publication deadlines cannot be moved on a whim, so J-Fed's contention the information is "inaccurate" and that he told union officials is disingenuous at best. It was accurate when the FOP found out about it and everything in the intervening time had no bearing on the newsletter arriving on everyone's doorstep, generating the righteous indignation, ridicule and outrage that it did.

J-Fed and the "policy group" had every opportunity to never leak this out in the first place, but someone just had to show how smart they were. Then after word started to spread (you can find some of the rumors in our comment sections two months ago), they had not only the two unnamed blogs to correct and defuse the rumor, they had the AdMin Fax Network, numerous Exempt meetings and even this "insignificant" site.

For whatever reasons, they chose not to. Too bad. Another blown opportunity to suck up to the rank and file. And another opportunity for everyone else to have another whack at the J-Fed pinata.

UPDATE: Anyone care to forward us a copy of the Customer Survey cards that were to be handed out? You know there are boxes of these things lying around some districts because the roll-out date was to be 15 October. As soon as this post goes up, the "policy group" people are going to be making flurries of phone calls to try to spare themselves embarrassment and further derision.

UPDATE II: Someone is claiming the cards were never printed. This is Chicago, right? The city of the "wink and the nod" that promised billions in construction contracts long before the Olympics didn't quite make it here? We'll bet $20 right now that not only were the cards printed, boxed and delivered, the connected printing operation that did the job already got paid.