BART Police Interim Chief Kevin Franklin promoted to top job
Following a nationwide search, BART has announced the hiring of a new police chief who is a 27-year veteran of the department and native of Oakland.
Chief Kevin Franklin takes over as BART struggles to rebuild ridership, and that includes potential passengers with safety concerns. BART General Manager Bob Powers made the announcement on Sunday.
"Chief Franklin is a life-long BART rider with an intimate knowledge of the system and its police department," said Powers in a statement released by the agency. "Kevin was instrumental in BPD's new deployment strategy that has significantly increased the presence of uniformed police personnel on trains and in stations. He is not only detail-oriented, but a creative thinker with a deep commitment to our community. I am confident his leadership will help BART continue to improve the safety of our riders."
"We have heard very clearly from our passengers that they want to see more uniformed presence on the trains," said Chief Kevin Franklin. "Both from our sworn police officers and our unarmed civilians."
Franklin says what passengers want is simple: safe and clean trains. And he knows a lot of people are skeptical these days.
"I acknowledge that the perception that people have right now is often negative because of some of the things they may have heard about the system," he told KPIX Monday.
He says the answer to the problems and the perception is more patrols on more cars. He is one of the reasons trains recently got a few cars shorter.
"We believe the active spaces are safer spaces," Franklin said. "And it also allows my officers to patrol more of the train cars that are out there."
The idea is to get as many people on as many trains as possible, to deal with everything from safety to litter. To do that, the department is hiring and boosting officer pay.
"One of the things I'm trying to do right now is aggressively recruit for 29 vacancies that I have," Franklin said of his priorities. "So by increasing the staffing in the department, that allows me to do even more of the work that is out there. But for right now, I'm maximizing existing resources."
Franklin mentioned that his family rides BART and he himself is a lifelong BART passenger. In fact, he actually rode one of those opening day trains out of Lake Merritt Station back in 1972, when he was 3 years old. He was back in the same station, as the system faces historic challenges of ridership, rider confidence, and long term funding.
It is no small set of challenges facing the new BART police chief.
Along with more patrols, BART also says new faregates will help. The first of these will go up in West Oakland before the end of the year.
