SMILING FACES DON'T ALWAYS TELL THE TRUTH

It appears from all the signs that a cooperative effort to address drug
trafficking concerns between Paintsville police and the Johnson County
Sheriff's department is in a deep coma from which it is unlikely to
recover. Though we are being told that problems are being worked out, the
truth is that they are not and the animosity between the agencies is growing.

Officials can put on their smiling faces in public if they want, but that
doesn't stop the grumbling we hear behind the scenes. Nor does it repair
the damage done. And, they aren't mending any fences, obviously (see
letters to the editor), when they let the rank and file pull nails as
quickly as they are driven.

The impending collapse of the Paintsville-Johnson County Drug Task Force is
clearly the result of personality conflicts and not the actual
effectiveness of the project which, as we have detailed in a variety of
news accounts, was quite positive. What a shame that grownups can't put
their egos aside for the benefit of the masses.

This isn't the first time such a beneficial and logical co-op among police
has run into a dead end. A few years back, a similar but much broader
consortium of law enforcement agencies went gunning for street-level
dopers, making a sizable dent in the illicit trade in several Eastern
Kentucky counties and communities.

The Mountain Area Drug Task Force was working fairly well when it ran
aground. It too was the victim of misplaced egoism, though the death blow
was dealt through allegations, petty allegations, of mismanagement.

Maybe there's something in the water around here that keeps our police
agencies at arms length from one another. Certainly we'd rather pin our
difficulties on a virus than come to terms with the possibility that we've
got some very immature people carrying guns and badges. Ah, but the reality
comes like a slap in the face.

We've heard police officers from various agencies gripe more about the
publicity their peers attract in the drug wars than they talk about the
dangers of or solutions to our problems with drugs. Rather than applaud
successes, by whoever, some officers and agencies just can't seem to
control their green-eyed envy over who is and who isn't getting front-page
notice. Rather than communicate their own department efforts with the
media, some agencies just clam up, thinking they are punishing us by going
incommunicado. We said this before, we'll say it again...

This newspaper does not play favorites in news coverage. If one agency
appears to get more ink than another it is because that agency invites us
along when it makes a bust or it communicates with us regularly about its
activities.

Because we cover news in five counties we must weigh the news value of
every picture we take and every story we write. The most significant make
the front page. We have news bureaus in Louisa, Inez, Paintsville,
Prestonsburg and will open soon in Salyersville. This paper strongly
supports law and order efforts throughout the Big Sandy region, and our
thousands of readers want to be kept informed about the efforts to reduce
all crime.

Right now, many of those readers would like to know why successful,
effective projects are being shelved and why some of our police agencies
are more concerned with who is getting publicity than how effective we are
in the attack on crime.

Right now, many of our readers would prefer that our police agencies bury
the hatchets...somewhere other than in one another's backs...and get on
with the business of making their communities, counties and region safer
places to live, work and raise kids. In our book, fighting crime isn't
about who gets noticed, but what gets done.

Failure isn't an option any of us wish to publicize.

- --Scott Perry