It's 11:30 PM and your cell phone rings. You don't recognize the number and let the call go to voice mail.
The phone rings again. Same number. This time, you answer the call.
It's probation standing at the front door. It's not your assigned PO, but two unknown others who wax philosophic that technically--because you didn't answer the phone--they have the power to violate your probation.
The above scenario played out with my loved one last night. It is unusual in the respect that no one other than the assigned PO has ever come calling IN FOUR YEARS to conduct a curfew check or any other charming supervisory duty.
Which raises my antennae.
I'm telling you this to prepare for what I believe is a directive given to Florida PO's to prove their necessity by violating anyone over anything until Chain Gang Charlie Crist redlines through the state legislature's recommendation to cut 66 probation officer positions.
Get your house in order.
Living in a rambling 1920's bungalow, persons knocking at the front door of my family member can't be heard on a good day. Add electric heat running at full force and the ring of the land line proves inaudible over the vibrating hum of the home.
The cell phone was the last avenue of communication.
If not for the fact that quite obviously he had been awakened, AG Bill McCollum could've chalked up one more statistic towards recidivism because my loved one literally didn't have his own house in order.
Not to mention the wait in jail for a month waiting for a judge to dismiss the charge. Wave good-bye to your job in an economic time where good employment is a handcuff away for those waiting to snatch yours up.
Be hypervigilant.
Don't put yourselves in the position of becoming a statistic.
And be careful out there. We may have a constitutional attorney in the White House but as far as Florida goes, our lawmakers enjoy keeping their constituents in the dog house.
Crist reversed $16.2 million in "public safety" cuts, a move that he said would preserve the jobs of 118 probation officers. However, the restoration came too late to save the jobs of 66 rookie probation officers who were laid off the day after the special session ended, the result of a previous round of cuts. (Florida Today, 1/27/09)
