America had a fuel crisis in the 1970s and it trickled all the way down to Madera County where the price of gasoline had climbed to an incredible 54 cents a gallon. That is why Madera County Sheriff Ed Bates asked the Board of Supervisors for more fuel money, and when he didn’t get it, the county’s top lawman dropped a bombshell in 1975.
La reacción pública de Bates ante el rechazo de la junta a su solicitud de $21,000 adicionales se convirtió en un sueño hecho realidad para los medios de comunicación. La cobertura televisiva y de los periódicos en todo el estado se centró en la Oficina del Sheriff del condado de Madera cuando Bates anunció que suspendería todas las patrullas de sus agentes en el condado y dijo: ’Si yo fuera un delincuente, vendría aquí. ¿Por qué arriesgarse a que me atrapen en los condados de Merced o Fresno?“. Bates dijo que ningún auto saldría del patio, salvo en situaciones de ”vida o muerte“ o en caso de ”delitos en curso“.”
By 1975, no one was surprised at Bates’ ability to hold his own with the supervisors. Early in his first term he had engaged them in a fierce tug-o-war over money, and he showed then that he was fully capable of using the media to make his point. Now at the beginning of his second term the high-sheriff once again drew the line in the sand.
Originally the sheriff’s automotive budget had been set at $60,000 for the 1974-1975 fiscal year, but by February 1975 rising fuel costs had taken all but $12,000 of that amount, so Bates put out his hand for more money.
El oficial administrativo del condado, Donald Handly, al darse cuenta de que Bates no contaba con los fondos necesarios en su presupuesto para llegar hasta el final del año fiscal, propuso que la junta transfiriera $21,000 de la reserva sin restricciones del condado al presupuesto de automoción de Bates. Sabía que la mayoría de la junta aceptaría la medida, pero no estaba del todo preparado para lo que vino después.
When the board took up the budget transfer request, Supervisors Elmo Del Bianco, Lonnie Cornwell, and Chairman Bill Hill voted in the affirmative, but to no one’s surprise, Jack Schmitz, Bates’ nemesis on the board, turned thumbs down. Under normal circumstances that would have been the end of the story; however, in this case the law stated that the transfer from the unrestricted reserve required a four-fifths majority. The sheriff needed the vote of the board’s newest member, Al Ginsburg.
Ginsburg had been elected just a few months before and was well known as a fiscal conservative — level headed but extremely frugal with the public’s money. When the question was called on the transfer, Ginsburg sided with Schmitz and voted no. Thus, two members on the five-man board stopped the transfer, and Bates declared war.
After publicly announcing his plan to halt rural patrols by his deputies, Bates was as good as his word. The next day, the sheriff’s 17 patrol cars sat idle in Madera, Chowchilla, and the mountain area. The only lawman from the Sheriff’s Office who remained on patrol was Bates himself. He hit the road in his own four-wheel drive vehicle, using his own gasoline.
Mientras tanto, la mayoría de la junta directiva se dio cuenta de que tenía un problema. Reporteros de todo California se preparaban para venir a Madera, y cuando llegaran encontrarían al sheriff intentando patrullar todo el condado completamente solo mientras sus agentes permanecían en la oficina haciendo papeleo. Claramente había que hacer algo.
Hill, Cornwell y Del Bianco sabían que el sheriff tenía la sartén por el mango. Su mejor opción era persuadir a Schmitz o a Ginsburg para que cambiara su voto y permitiera la transferencia presupuestaria, así que Hill organizó una reunión entre Bates, Ginsburg y él mismo.
Hill sabía que habría sido una pérdida de tiempo colosal intentar reunir a Schmitz y a Bates. El supervisor de mucho tiempo del Distrito Dos había sido el opositor más persistente de Bates en la junta, y había dejado constancia al describir la retirada de patrullas de Bates como una ’maniobra política’ y “infantil”. Schmitz comparó toda la situación con “darle a un niño una bolsa de caramelos y decirle que tiene que durar, y luego hacer que vuelva por más al día siguiente. Luego, cuando dices que no, hace un berrinche”.“
Ginsburg, on the other hand, seemed not to be quite as entrenched. When he cast his no vote the day before, he said that he was doing so to make a point. He wanted the Sheriff to accept some of the burden himself by finding additional funds within other parts of his budget. Ginsburg told the Tribune that he fully expected there to be another request for funds from the Sheriff and hinted that he would vote yes at that time. Ginsburg, however, had reckoned without the sheriff’s resolve. Bates declared that he had no intention of going back to the board. The patrols would remain idle until the supervisors made the transfer he had requested.
El jueves por la tarde, en una reunión con Bates, Ginsburg prometió cambiar su voto en la próxima junta directiva. A cambio de este “pacto de caballeros”, el sheriff canceló el boicot de patrullaje y, para el viernes, los agentes volvían a estar patrullando. Irónicamente, el mismo día llegaron a Madera siete nuevas patrullas destinadas a la Oficina del Sheriff.
At its meeting on Tuesday, February 18, 1975, the board approved a transfer of $18,000 from the unrestricted reserve to the sheriff’s automotive budget, but not without another outburst of acrimony. When Ginsburg accused Bates of looking for an “open end” budget, the sheriff responded by calling the supervisor a liar and challenged him to take a lie detector test.
Nevertheless the crisis in law enforcement was defused. County patrols resumed, and an uneasy peace settled in as the supervisors awaited the next test of wills that would surely come as long as any member of the board thought he could make Sheriff Bates toe the mark.