The I Love CVille Show With Jerry Miller! - Charlottesville Chief Of Police Mike Kochis Joined Jerry Miller Live On “The I Love CVille Show!”

Episode Date: May 28, 2025

Charlottesville Chief of Police Mike Kochis joined Jerry Miller live on The I Love CVille Show! The I Love CVille Show airs live Monday – Friday from 12:30 pm – 1:30 pm on The I Love CVille Network. Watch and listen to The I Love CVille Show on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, iTunes, Apple Podcast, YouTube, Spotify, Fountain, Amazon Music, Audible, Rumble and iLoveCVille.com.

guys welcome to the I love Seville show my name is Jerry Miller thank you kindly for joining us in downtown Charlottesville it's a pleasure to connect with you guys through the I love Seville network it's been a good week so far a short week thanks to Memorial Day yesterday Dave Shreve our guest a candidate for our county board of supervisors in the Jack Jewett district. And today, we're very excited to have Police Chief Mike Kochis in our studio. We have dubbed him the George Clooney of policing.

My wife, who watches the show, I love her dearly, says she enjoys when Mike Kochis comes on. And I said, sweetheart, should I be jealous about that? Are you watching me? Are you watching Chief Koch? And she just chuckled over morning coffee. A lot we're going to cover on the program. We have covered of late the Do we call it a debacle? Do we call it a I don't know what we call it on Elliott Avenue where a local activist is chosen to paint a crosswalk in a 35 mile an hour Neighborhood hub for pretty significant Transportation and automobile traffic. We'll talk about that today. I see a boatload of

Questions already for chief conscious a lot of them around the downtown mall of questions already for Chief Kochist, a lot of them around the downtown mall, some of them on the city budget, and some of them on how he's gonna continue to move the department forward from a positive fashion. I wanna highlight one of the partners of our show. We were there today. It was Charlottesville Sanitary Supply,

and goodness gracious, John Vermillion, who he corrected me, he's at least four generations in Elmhurst County, and his son, Andrew Vermillion, they own Charlottesville Sanitary Supply, had a turnstile of customers going in the door and these guys did it the right way, the honest way, the communicative way, back with integrity

at Charlottesville Sanitary Supply and I could not be more happy to see local businesses doing local efforts and traffic with customers. Support the businesses in the community you wanna see make it another 60 years and Charlottesville Sanitary Supply is absolutely one of them. Judah Wickhauer is behind the camera.

15 years this man has managed the psychosis of my personality which is a testament to his metronome light consistency with his personality. I don't say it enough, Judah. I am very grateful for you. I sincerely mean that. We are completely opposite in personality, but I think that's why the business works. Judah Wickhauer, if we can go to the studio camera in a two-shot and welcome the George Clooney of policing, Mike Kochis, who's two and a half years on the job. Goodness gracious.

Flies by, Jerry. Two and a half years? Yeah, man. How's it going? Things are going great. Really is. I'm still having just as much fun today that I did when I first got here. Yeah. How's the open-ended question here? Talk to us about all the efforts and the positivity with the police department. Yeah I mean well just I just got the news yesterday we only have one vacancy. Nice. And I mean, that's down from over 30, about two and a half years ago. Wasn't it a third, close to a third vacant? Yeah. Oh yeah. It was, it

was bad. I mean, you can't do things without people, you know? So, so we've made a lot of progress and, um, you know, the benefit of hiring that many people is, uh, when you talk about creating a culture, culture of excellence, culture of professionalism, culture of empathy, both in the building and in the community. You know, you can make a lot of progress pretty quickly. So, but yeah, we're working hard each and every day. One vacancy. One. Congratulations. How have you been able to fill the department? I think I don't think it was one thing. You know, the folks that we had here, you know, when I first got here, good people, you know, and they've worked, you know, they've worked super hard, laser focused on getting people in the

door and they've bought into the vision and mission that we've created together, you know, and that's what it comes down to at the end of the day. You know, you create a vision, you give it to your folks and they take it and run with it and they've really done that and they've done just a tremendous job. So I'm fortunate every day that people still wanna do this job. Now, I've been in, you know, I've had relationships, got to know some of your officers extremely well

in my 25 years here, have a lot of respect for them. I've tried to highlight this on behalf of your department of the challenges of living in the city they're serving within. You are filling the vacancies. Can I ask how many in the department are able to live in the city? Maybe a handful, if that.

I mean like five. Yeah, you can't. But you see it everywhere. You know, I mean, this city is expensive. You know, and I come from Northern Virginia and thought, you know thought that it's not, it costs a lot and it ain't getting any easier. So I think the benefit here, I was talking to Alexandria's chief not too long ago,

but in my contacts up there, one of the problems they have up there is geography. 25 years ago, you could be a cop in Alexandria and afford a home in like Western Prince William County or Stafford County. That's not the case anymore. You know, and so I don't know where you live. Here at least you could go out and still buy a home in some of the surrounding areas, you know, and still work in the city. But I think those days are number two. So a lot we've covered on the show, why don't we start open ended. We've seen the interaction or the crossroads of local media, local activism, your service as the police chief, and how a turn of events was reported by legacy media, specifically

the Daily Progress. I will get out of your way, set the stage of what happened. Yeah, so here's what I will say. And I want to, I'll preface it with this to talk about our local reporter that has been here for a very long time who I believe is probably one of the best in the business. Easily.

Just he's really good at what he does. And I think that's good for our community, you know? Because we all need checks and balances, including government. And so, you know, this report, this story about the crosswalk situation, you know, it came out and then there was a headline posted. And I remember seeing, and again, I don't do a whole lot of social media stuff. I sure as heck don't pay attention to comments or any of that type of stuff. Okay So someone had sent it to me and I'm like, well, that's well, that's not true. That never happened

So, you know when I what I found out was that the reporter actually doesn't put the headline So the reporter does the story and sends it to the editor who then creates a headline right and I get it you create headlines to get clicks and to get people's attention to try to get them to get past the paywall and all that kind of stuff. I think my problem with it is that, you know, and again, that's all fine and dandy, but when it's simply not true, and when there is the assertion that political motivation influenced the decision to investigate or charge, I think that's dangerous, really dangerous.

And I mean, nobody wants that. And I can tell you, look, the city manager, he's my boss. Sam Sanders. Sam Sanders could tell me to do a lot of things. But he didn't. And that's not his style. He doesn't operate in a bubble. And so when I saw that, I was just like, man.

So anyway, there was a correction made. And then when the correction was made, it said something to the effect. It changed from called me to tell me to arrest him to called me before he was arrested, which also isn't true. That never happened either And so I just think that you know people make mistakes

Police we make mistakes, you know, it happens, but I think that you know, the right conversation needs to get out there because Whether someone is an activist in any capacity plays absolutely no role in how we investigate or decisions we make and how or when to charge someone and we consult with the commonwealth attorney's office we make those decisions and then a judge will hear the evidence of the case and they make a decision based on the law and the Constitution United States whether that person is an activist or not does not play a role and should not play a role and that that's just the truth. So I'll offer a

little bit more a little color here. John Blair, thank you for watching the program on LinkedIn. And viewers and listeners, let us know your thoughts. Kevin Cox, a local pedestrian, bicycle, and transportation activist in the city of Charlottesville, he's actually reached out to us about some of the stuff we've talked about. And he, on Elliott Avenue, chose on his own prerogative to go to Amazon online and purchase what he has called water soluble chalk, and I'm sure we'll talk about that.

Absolutely. And he, on his prerogative, chose to paint a crosswalk on Elliott Avenue and he said he did this to honor a Liberian woman who was struck by a teenager and since perished from that accident. Point of clarity, the Liberian woman who unfortunately and tragically passed away, it wasn't the exact location where he painted that crosswalk. It was further down Elliott Avenue. Kevin Cox says that he let Sam Sanders know via email

that he was doing this and that the chalk that he purchased from Amazon was erasable through some kind of water cleaning method. And then he said, I'm going to go do this. The Daily Progress reported this. Hal Spencer, the author, I think you might be watching, is a fantastic reporter, is a friend, is a neighbor. The initial headline that came

out late last week was Charlottesville City Manager personally called police chief to arrest pedestrian advocate. That headline then changed later that day to Charlottesville City Manager personally called Police Chief before arrest of pedestrian advocate. So Chief Cotchis, neither of those headlines. Neither of those are true. Is active or is accurate?

They're both false. Neither of those happened. Okay. So the correction from the daily progress and mistakes do happen, but a huge egregious aspect of journalism is when you make a mistake on the correction. So that headline, how did the chain of communication transpire? I have a relationship with Halls because he's a great reporter and he'll typically call him, something pops up and say, hey, do you want to comment on this or something like

that? Sometimes I won't. Sure. Sometimes I will. It just depends. I have a job to do, he has a job to do, and I believe we both respect each other in those jobs. I brought it to his attention, and I'll be honest with you, and I won't get into personal conversations with Halls

just because I respect him. It was pretty clear to him as soon as I brought to his attention that there was a mistake. Yeah. A big one. Yeah, and Hall Spencer, don't like to speak for people, but I'm confident I can speak for him in this regard. He wants to do journalism the right way. And he would say that if he was on the show. So does, how does the communication go from Sam Sanders

email inbox? Because Kevin Cox said he emailed the city manager. What's the chain of communication? So first of all, that's kind of accurate what you have there, but there's a little so first of all, the email that was sent to the city manager from Mr. Cox did not say how to clean it or anything like that. There was no mention of that. And so at that point, the manager to their leadership team was like, hey, this was just sent to me that this exists on the street. What exposure do we have as a city if we leave it there? So think about this.

If traffic engineers who get paid to do this job that are professionals made an opinion on whether there should be a crosswalk there or not. I'm not a traffic engineer, so whether it should be or crosswalk there or not. I'm not a traffic engineer so whether it should be or shouldn't that's not my expertise. But that decision was made based on a lot of things. And it was communicated, it's been communicated. This is nothing new. And so the idea that the city keeps that there and someone were to cross and get hit and we know about it,

there could be some exposure there, right? And so when that was brought to our attention, I said, okay, well, at least we'll send an officer out there to go look at it. So we did that. And then we had public works come in and say, hey, come out, can we clean, can you all just get this stuff up, clean this up?

They couldn't, it couldn't come up. And so it's had to be, it had to be painted over in the tune of a few hundred dollars. Just a little over 500. Well, we got more. Okay, so then the it's been showing through the black paint. Okay, so they had to go back out there again. Okay. So now we're looking a little over $1,000 of taxpayer dollars that have had to do this. Now, the other thing too

is what I think wasn't said about the woman who had passed of taxpayer dollars that have had to do this now the other thing too is What I think wasn't said about the the woman who had passed away from being hit You're right. That didn't happen there. It actually happened to block up in a crosswalk Right, so she was killed in a crosswalk a block up So I just think that's you know, and again, I don't want to get into details about Mr. Cox's case or anything like that. That would be inappropriate. And I'll be clear, he's innocent until proven guilty in a court, right? And that, we have to recognize that.

But yeah, I just think there's a lot of misinformation out there. And we just got to get the right information out. I respect that. And I think that's what we're trying to do here. Yeah. How about, and Logan Wells-Clayllow watching the program, you got four media outlets on the show locally that are watching the show right now. I think that's all four of them.

What do we say, chief conscious, to utilizing the law to arrest an elderly man? I think that's safe to say he's over 80, regardless of age, but utilizing the law to arrest someone for painting a crosswalk when we've seen in other cases perhaps the law or a Commonwealth Attorney's Office not pursue full force for other actions that may from a perception standpoint seem way more dangerous or egregious. So I don't know any specific case that you're talking about that there, so I don't think it would be fair to say.

I could tell you just from my experience when it comes to especially involving cases involving firearms, our Commonwealth Attorney's Office is extremely aggressive and they get significant sentences. So that's something that Mr. Plotinia has really prioritized and his office. Like I said before, the fact that somebody is an activist, their age, lots of things, obviously this thing wasn't just, the decision wasn't just made to place the charge, right?

There was an investigation that occurred. It was assigned to a detective because video had to be occurred, you know, lots of statements were made. All these things had to be put together in coordination with the Commonwealth Attorney's Office. And the appropriate charge was decided. Mr. Cox was asked to turn himself in, which he did. He was called.

He turned himself in. He was booked and then our detective drove him home. And so we handled it, I think appropriately. I think that's how we should handle a case such as this. I'll throw this to you. Are they similar or can they be seen in the same category? We have residents in the Belmont neighborhood that have painted beautiful sundials on cross sections,

on city roads, in areas that are high traffic, pedestrian, automobile, bicycle. The sundials are an attraction for Belmont. Why no pursuit legally for those sundial being painted in Belmont? And then alternatively, which I find actually deplorable, which we covered during the Black Lives Matter movement, we had activists that were legitimately spray painting the Charlottesville Police Department. Now this was before your time. Yeah.

And I know you may not want to comment on that. Another thing that I find frankly deplorable that we've actually tried to scrub Ourself is outside our studio on the unit the US post office box There's nasty commentary to police officers that I see literally every day And in fact when I went out and scrubbed it one day, I was actually told you can't touch this This is federal property. You can't even clean it. So then I left it alone, but I see it every day This is federal property. You can't even clean it. So then I left it alone, but I see it every day First the sundials in Belmont. So I don't know what the sundials look like in Belmont I think the case we're talking about has to do with creating a

Traffic control device a fake traffic control device. That's not approved That is created against the advice of the professionals who know what to do with this job and could create significant danger to the community. And so I think you have to take that in consideration. Every case has got to be looked at very differently based on the facts. And so the sundials, I haven't seen the sundial,

so I don't know what you're talking about. Like you said, I wasn't here in 2020 when that occurred, but if people damage property, you know, we need to investigate that and, you know, hold them accountable if appropriate. You know, there's graffiti cases that we have that we have charged. Is that the SEP? S-E-P? Correct. Yeah, we put it, we put out a news release with that. Yeah, I'm glad you did that. And an arrest was made. Yeah. You know, you don't get to just spray paint city property like that and you know they're investigated, resources are put to it and we make appropriate charges.

Jessica Larocco watching on YouTube and she says Kevin made the arrest sound way different. She appreciates the interview we're doing now. You have literally every media outlet watching you now. James Watson, Jason Jason Noble viewers and listeners if you have questions put them in the feed I'll relay them live on air. This is one that's coming to fit on the feed What is the communication like with the city manager and chief conscious? Does the city manager communicate anything policing wise to the police chief in like in just in general? Yeah Yeah, I talked to the city manager all the time. He's my boss I report directly to him

He is probably and I've done, you know I've been a chief in two different jurisdictions and work for several city managers probably the most thoughtful city manager I've ever worked for and He's collaborative Yeah, and I guess that's why it bothered me the most. The city manager, if he wanted to, he could sit and tell me, hey, we, you know, as a city, we are going to do this and go down this road. And he, but that's not his style, you know. He, I don't know. And I guess that's what bothered me the most with that article.

Well, the initial reporting made the city manager, painted the city manager not in the best light. And that's unfair. And it was unfair. And it was unfair. And it wasn't true. Right, and why it was unfair, because it wasn't true. That's correct. If it was true and it was painted in that light

with the headline, then that's reporting that should be out there. But you are saying to the community that the headline was absolutely wrong, and then the correction on the headline was absolutely wrong, which I think is important for the community to know, because with policing, one of the most important aspects of policing is the word trust. That's why we're having this communication is trust was a bit jeopardized there.

Yeah, I mean, I think the community should trust its media outlets, at least to, maybe I'm naive. A lot of people say, I'll trust what you read in the news, right? But I hold the news in high regard because, or media in high regard, because they have a role in the community not only to hold us accountable, hold government accountable, you know, that's how our system works, you know, and how it should work. So yeah, it was a little disappointing. Well, and I'll give the kind of chain of events or the dominoes that followed.

When that headline was reported by the Daily Progress, then Charlottesville Radio Group and its news outlet jumped on the story and initially on Friday, positioned the story in a similar light. Then Judah and I read it on the DailyProgress.com and on Friday's show, we started talking about it in the light of that headline. So it had this kind of crescendo effect or a domino effect with other media that was talking about it in the light of that headline. So it had this kind of crescendo effect or a domino effect

with other media that was talking about it. And one of the reasons we reported on it was because we saw the byline, Hoss Spencer, and I trust him implicitly, because he's in a war winning journalists. But to Chief Kotches's point, Hoss does not write the headlines. So I'm curious to see if Reynolds Hutchinson, the editor of the Daily Progress, has follow-up coverage on how this was depicted in the newspaper and would almost encourage Reynolds to have his staff offer follow-up coverage in the newspaper because one of the disappointing aspects of media is the correction runs extremely small and the initial story runs far and wide. And people remember the initial story runs far and wide and people remember the initial

story resonates where the correction is often overlooked and forgotten and I think this is what Chief Cotchis is doing right here is he's saying look this was wrong and Sam Sanders did not do this which is basically Chief Cotchis in a lot of ways you know standing up for what's right and and having the back of a man and Sam Sanders it's doing a pretty hell of a job. He's doing a great job. Leading the city of Charlottesville. Is that a fair analysis here? Yeah, absolutely.

And look, they don't owe me an apology. No, I mean, nobody owes me an apology, right? I mean, saying you did something that you didn't do, that's wrong. But I'm a big boy, right? Yeah. And that is part of the job, right? You just got to take it. But the community deserves to know the truth. Fair, fair. Well, I we put it behind us there. I

I'll throw this to you because the police have been in the news locally of late. Sure. How about Culpepper County? Oh, and a sick. Okay, I'd love to throw this disgusting a police chief that was he was a sheriff, A sheriff. He called himself a sheriff. Yeah. And selling badges, selling power, essentially? Well, he was convicted. So I would talk about it. To undercover FBI agents taking bribes.

I mean, he's not even a close case. He was convicted by a jury since the 10 years. And somehow now he is full pardoned. Donald Trump has fully pardoned him. I don't want to talk about the politics of it. Okay. Because, you know, I work really hard to kind of stay away from the politics of things. But what was done was disgusting and it's a stain on our profession.

And it, you know, I don't understand it. You know, the whole pardon stuff I get it's president's prerogative to do. But this is kind of, this is close. I mean, it's just up the road. Yep. You know, and it's,'s prerogative to do but this is kind of this is close. I mean it's just up the road. Yeah. You know and it's again talking about public trust that's yeah makes me sick to this number. Well I see it's frustrating because I had a chance to get to know you and I had a chance to get to know your team members and your colleagues and you guys are good guys but it's the old saying that it's one bad apple spoils the entire barrel.

That's all it takes. You know, just yesterday I spoke to three brand new officers that graduated the academy, and it was, you know, after this whole pardon thing, and I tell them, I said, listen, your actions, what you do either brings value to that badge or takes it away. And there are folks here in this room, and there are people in the room that were here in 2017 and have been through a lot over the years and we're not going to tolerate that, right? So what you do, what you post online, all of these things either brings value to that badge or takes it away.

And yet we have this person who's staying that badge, has no business ever wearing it, pardoned and now he could, I'm assuming he could probably run for election again. I would think he could I would think he could Bill McChesney says the the Sun dials did not impact Pedestrian bicycle and transportation safety like the crosswalk did my phone's blowing up here with viewers and listeners Jason Noble respects the interview He says it's hard to trust any media outlet these days. It's everyone's responsibility to be at least a little skeptical and always seek clarity. Tina Wyant, breathe in watching the program. This question is an intriguing one. I'll throw it to Chief Conscious, but I think this might be more the courts, Joe

Plantania and the judge. Is the anticipation that Kevin Cox is going to get a pass on this? Well, look, I could tell you that the courts, you know, the one thing that, like I said, a judge or the courts usually want, I can be, I feel safe saying don't take into consideration, and that if you are a pedestrian activist or not, they're going to take into consideration the law, the Constitution, you know, and what's reasonable under the law. And so I can't speak for the courts and what will happen. There's still a lot that needs to happen when it comes to that trial or to that case.

I think what would end up happening, and this is just one man's speculation here, where Mr. Cox is gonna be asked to pay the cost that the city incurred for all this headache, the hard costs and some court costs and won't end up doing actual time. I think that's probably what's gonna happen, but we'll see, we'll follow it closely.

This conversation, this question has come in and it's about what's happened in the past. I think this is a fair one. What did Chief Kochis make of the protest last year at UVA when the Virginia State Police was in some ways militarized against students? Yeah, so I was I was in the command center when all that happened, worked with Chief Longo and his team. President Ryan was in the room, Mr. Hinjeley was in the room when these decisions were made

There was a lot that happened that led up to that And based on everything I saw the decision that was made was the right decision Again, it's there's there's a lot more to that conversation that happened there. But But yeah, I mean it wasn't a decision that was made in a bubble And we're talking several days that things were leading up to it and all kinds of other things So the tough the the tough aspect, you know, just kind of uh shooting it with you here. Uh having a conversation The tough aspect for me was the look Yeah, look sometimes policing looks really bad

I get we get that Right. There's some things are just you're just not gonna make look good. Yeah You know some it yes, this job sometimes really sucks but I mean it's the You know, it's sometimes policing is tough. Yeah, right this this this has been it's all over the feed here How has chief consciousotchess characterized the efforts the department has made with cleaning up downtown Charlottesville?

Yeah, so the downtown mall, we've made a lot of progress down there. We now have an officer on daylight shift to sign there every day, and on our evening shift to sign down on a downtown mall every day. And it's not to like bother people and just arrest, it's basically to be a resource there, you know?

And so obviously there's there's no secret you know the issues around housing in the city in general is it's a huge challenge I mean I was watching the the CRHA board meeting last night my wife won there's why I watched these things but I did do it right and you know mr. sales was talking about how they have affordable housing units in a new development that they can't rent because of the perceptions of crime in that area there, right? And so, you know, we have an important role to play. And you know, I can talk about crime being down. It's down 41 percent.

Gun violence is down 41 percent over a three-year average. But you know, it doesn't matter to those folks who live in a community that are hearing gunshots, who were a bullet, maybe went through their car window with their kid in it or something. You know, like we could talk about numbers. That happened at Brookdale, over the weekend. It happened over the weekend, it sure did.

In Alamaro County, on Country Green, off Fifth Street Extended, across from the Alamaro County Police Department. Yep, and we're working with them right now, and we've made a lot of progress on that case with Albemarle by using our flock camera system, actually. So the conversation around crime, I think, and housing, it's all interconnected, and you've got to understand that.

I've been a huge, and I've caught so many arrows on this, of a huge proponent of flock cameras here locally. And a group in Charlottesville, we know who they are, have online and socially and digitally attacked my stance on why not have the flock cameras. Can we have the conversation about flock? The positive- I told you nothing's off the table. We can talk about it.

Yeah. How about flock? The positives that come with it and the feedback? How about maybe some of the negative feedback you've heard on it? Well, so you hear it. And listen, that's OK. You know, I mean, I think we've talked about it right after we started the pilot.

You know, it was a 3-2 vote on council. I think Payne and Oshren were against it. Yeah. But you know what? Good questions. And they're good people. I can tell you that while they they may disagree with some of the things that police point wants to do and whatnot, I mean, they're

that's their job. Yeah, right to represent their constituents. Yeah, so I think as long as we're having good conversations about the truth, there's a lot of stuff out there. And you know, if you watch certain media or wherever is on your computer, that's all you're being fed now. Sure. Right. So you're never going to get the other side of it. So I hear a lot of that stuff. Yeah. The reality of it is we are using it to solve crimes. We are using it mostly to solve crimes in our neighborhoods that are disproportionately affected by violent crimes.

Okay. All right? I'm speaking tonight at the 10th and Page neighborhood on Flock. Your neighborhood? Yes, my neighborhood. Yeah. And, you know, the, there are folks FAR, you know, Miss Johnson from FAR was a huge was at least then and I'm assuming still is a supporter of the flock program. Now look,

there are things that we have to continue to be checking on, right? And so like who do we share information with? Who has access to it? We had this conversation this morning with my staff and I'll be brief and said I want to get out of it. I'm gonna be briefing City Council on some of the stuff out there to kind of that I'm following up on so I can at least respond to them and say hey this is what I know these are the this is the truth this is what might not be the truth I'll let you know we'll get that information. Because the concern is that the data there could be a data breach

and that data can get out there somehow. I'm not sure the concern is as much as a data breach as it is that folks like like the federal government or ICE may get access to our system. Yeah. I understand that fear. And I mean, you know, when you have folks showing up at the courthouse with masks and no badges, right? Drag people like that happened here.

So that's people. That's terrifying. It absolutely was. And it was unprofessional. And I've let that known to folks who I know within the federal government that what are you doing? That's unsafe. You just don't do that. That's not how you operate.

So anyway, I think those are legitimate concerns and I'll answer them. What did why don't we ask I'll ask you that question. You've kind of given some perspective on that. Three guys in a backpack, one wearing a mask with no badges, no markings, unmarked vehicle, take two people out of a courthouse. They're lucky they didn't get their butts kicked. I mean, someone, I mean, you tried, you walk up on a mat with a mask on, no badge, you grab me, I'm going to fight you until you, I know who you are, right? Like so it's um from it's not how you operate

It's not how you do and so I think they would concede they probably made mistakes there, too What they were doing the conversation around immigration enforcement and all that kind of stuff look I don't have the resources to do immigration enforcement even if we were but we don't right don't enforce immigration law. We don't enforce You know administrative law, which is what immigration law is We don't enforce immigration law, we don't enforce you know administrative law, which is what immigration law is. We don't ask immigration status. We have enough work to do on our own to be dealing with that. Comments put them in the feed. I see a lot of them coming here. The public cameras on the downtown mall, are they for police use or only cameras associated with businesses on the mall? I don't know. I'm not aware of any public cameras, like police cameras on the downtown

mall other than around the police department for like securing and stuff. I know the businesses, a lot of them have cameras on the downtown mall and if we have a case and we need camera footage, we believe it may have captured something. They work with us and get us that footage. So I do not our cameras. Right. Okay. So I do, I can offer some perspective on this. I do know an organization that I speak with often, big fan of her, the executive director, Greer Akenbach and Friends of Seaville,

which is the nonprofit lobbying group for downtown Charlottesville. They had put up cameras on the downtown mall on their dime on fundraised dime. And those cameras are strategically positioned around the mall. So say the Tom Tom event where there was an unfortunate shooting that yielded no harm but still a shooting that scared a lot of people.

Is that where the police department may check those cameras? Absolutely. Okay. And we do. Okay. Absolutely. And you guys were on there so quickly. Was that just because of the-

We had a lot of resources working in TomTom Festival. I mean, anytime you have a lot of people in one place, you know, for a period of time, there's a lot of resources that go into that. You know, if you notice, we used this Meridian Barriers this time as well that they're supposed to use in New Orleans. So we, you know, we went and looked at New Orleans, say, hey, what happened there before the TomTom Festival? We'll make sure that we understand the lessons learned, you know,

because my fear is a car or something like that, you know. And so, so we took every precaution. D.I. Jones, who you, I know you know well, he's the, he was our incident commander that helped coordinate and work on that for weeks without a day off, just getting ready to make sure that it was a secure and safe event. Officer Jones was the, the patrol officer on the UVA corner when I was a student at the University of Virginia, and one of the most fairest officers

that I have encountered, and a good man. I hope he hears that. Comments are coming in here quickly. We're trying to get to as many of these as possible. Here's an interesting one. What does Chief Kochis think is the dynamic between expensive housing and crime in Charlottesville? Well, I mean violent crime is rooted in poverty.

We know that, right? And so, you know, I would say if you have really expensive homes and you have, again, I'm not a housing expert. I probably know more about it than I ever thought I would but if you have a real expensive homes and you know Low-income homes. There's no middle ground right with the missing middle. I guess is what they call it, you know so I think there's there's clearly a correlation between poverty and And in crime, I mean we see that I don't think you know you see that everywhere

and in crime. I mean, we see that. I don't think, you know, you see that everywhere. Ginny Hu, it's nice to hear Chief Koch has confirmed that I've always, what I've always believed about the UVA situation, the correct decision was made based on information that was available to the people who needed to have it. And she's referencing that with the Virginia State Police

being militarized against protesters on grounds. This is coming from number one in the family. Can you ask Chief Cotches about the extremely high proportion of shots fired and gun incidents that take place in or around CRHA properties? What is his relationship like with CRHA? Does CRHA need to do more in terms of its own responsibilities of weeding out tenants who endanger other tenants and the general public? So I have a great relationship with CRHA.

But let me start by saying, actually shots fired are down, right, data wise. But guess who doesn't care about that? Folks that live there. The house that got shot up last Monday on Hardy Drive, right? They don't want to hear that. So, but I have a great relationship with CRHA and talk, I was talking to Mr. Sales this morning, you know, and so if folks, you know, if it's appropriate, if someone be evicted for whatever the case may be, because they're preying on that community, well then we work with them and, you know,

that's their decision to make that decision. But I will say it's a small group of individuals in these communities. I mean, what, CRHA has like maybe a, I mean, West Haven maybe 150 units? I mean, I could probably think of three or four that are problems. That's it. But it's a big problem, you know?

And so we've really been working with CRHA closely to help address those issues. And we have a great relationship. This question's a big problem, you know, and so we've really been working with CRHA closely to help address those issues. And we have a great relationship. This question is a good one. Why does it seem like the young men that create most of the trouble for this area are often in and out of jail? Does Chief Cotchis think the courts need to be a bit tougher on them?

Well, I'm a cop, so I think the courts, yes, should be tougher on them. That being said, you know, why are they in and out? I think every case is a little different. We clearly got to invest in reentry. I mean, the reality of it is, Jerry, is most people don't go to jail for the rest of their life. So at some point, they're going to go out, get out, and they're going to be back into

society. And so we need to do a better job of preparing these folks to reenter society and be productive members of our community. I don't think we do a good enough job with that. Probably don't invest enough resources in it. The program Home to Hope is an awesome program. It's on the downtown mall.

Yeah, they're great. Great folks doing really good work. I don't think it gets enough attention. I mean, that's where we make our progress. Yeah, but every case is a little different. And so some folks deserve longer sentences than others. Lani Murray, welcome to the program. Keith Smith, love Keith Smith watching the program.

You've got elected officials from the city of Charlottesville, Elmora County, Nelson County, and Louisa watching the program. And you have a couple of delegates watching the program here. This comment has come in related to FLOC. What about the controversy over department wanting to use is it Paragrine? Paragrine. Paragrine. Can Chief Cotchis explain what it is and why it will help police?

Is there any worry about our data leaking to this company? Well, so Paragrine, again, there was you had one person that showed up to a council meeting that said a whole bunch of things about this company and they were talking about a different company. So they were talking about Palantir, which does a lot of the things they were talking about. It's a publicly traded company. I actually own stock in Palantir.

Palantir is a different company. It's been around a long time. Yeah. Peregrin is a completely separate company. And what Peregrin does, it just fuses our current systems together. So like Axon, our body worn camera system, our payroll system, right? So I could say, hey, what officers are using a lot of leave and what's or use or working too much overtime and is there a correlation between our use of force, right? So to do that, we have to go in all these different systems, our payroll system, we have to go into our Axon system, which is

a different system, into our records management system, which is a different system, our CAD system, which is a different system. So this fuses all of them together and allows us to take a more data-driven approach on our decisions. That's all it is. But there was a lot of talk and all this stuff about it, and I get it, it came back to, and the questions I got was, can I ensure that DOJ or the federal government could get access to that? I don't know really how to answer that other than absolute search warrant or court order, a legal process, I don't know. I mean, that's the only way, the same as any other system we have.

So again, I think there's, and I understand it because I think some of it's probably warranted is the fear over federal government's reach. Goodness gracious, comments are coming in fast. Jason says, yes, absolutely harder consequences for bad behavior, please. This comment comes in, the Bridge Ministry is a reentry program that has been around here for years

that does a good job. Here's a great, very intriguing question. How much of the crime that is originating in Charlottesville or the crime that is originating in Almarra County is spillover crime from one jurisdiction to the other? Beefs or fighting for territory? Beefs. Yeah, so it is spillover?

It's just, Jerry, if I told you what some of these beefs are about, you wouldn't believe it and they're rolling up and just shooting up their entire neighborhoods over some stupid comment made on social media. Really? It's crazy. And so, but it is, I mean, these are groups of kids that are, you know, that equally is dangerous, you know, whether it's over territory or not. It's typically not over territory.

It's typically over these beefs that they're having. But yeah, we're seeing spillover between the county and Charlottesville. And our detectives, I got to tell you, we just had a regional ComStat meeting yesterday. And our detectives are communicating every day, working these cases together. Just like I said, the shooting over the weekend, we were able to make some progress on that case based on stuff from our flock cameras connecting it where that young child in the back seat of a car

was shot at. And I'll say this, the conversation around flock and getting rid of tools used to solve crime, I think it's okay to ask questions and have concerns about federal overreach and whatnot, but let's do it based on factual information. And let's do it understanding that real lives and real people are impacted by crime,

and if we have a tool to solve it, then we should be able to use it. I don't understand the pushback on FLOC or the pushback. I mean, I'm sympathetic to some of the privacy things because there are some jurisdictions that have, like Norfolk has like 180 of them and they have real-time crime centers and so it's like constant this and that.

So I get it and I appreciate the thoughtful questions that I receive, I really do, especially from our governing body. They're thoughtful and they're respectful and they just want answers. But as one of our viewers and listeners have said, if you're not doing anything wrong, what do you have to worry about?

Yeah, I mean, look, I understand that. I just, it's creepy when you talk about something and then you pick your phone up and it's like there's an ad for it's like everybody's listening to me it is it's kind of creepy right and so I so I get it I do I'm sympathetic to that how about this question does he have a back in the napkin estimate or maybe with conversation with Colonel Reeves a back in napkin estimate of the actual trouble makers that are in this community? Yes. What are we talking about?

A couple hundred? No. Less? We're talking about, so we're talking maybe 20, 30 people? No way. Oh yeah. 20 or 30, that's it? Oh yeah.

That are causing the- That we consider prolific offenders. That are causing the trouble for the- That are causing a majority of trouble. Absolutely. Oh my goodness. And that's why, Jerry, that's why we are taking a very focused approach. Yeah.

It's a model called focused deterrence, but it's really, instead of a shotgun approach to just, you know, or casting a wide net, we are, you know, we're really focusing on those specific offenders and saying, hey, let's deal with them, you know? So yeah, oh yeah, we're not talking hundreds. Twenty or thirty? Yes. That we would consider, you know, repeat violent offenders. Why? No, this is just a layman's perspective. Just a guy just talking with you here.

Why with those twenty to thirty aren't we like, why are they behind bars? Well, because there's a law, right? We got to put the appropriate cases with the appropriate people, you know, within the confines of the Constitution, right? And so, like, we may know someone is involved in this based on this and this and this, but that doesn't mean we have met the standard to actually place a charge, which is, by the way, a much lower standard to actually convict somebody in a court of law, right? So there's a lot of work.

Our folks just do a tremendous job and these detectives, I mean, they work their butts off day in and day out. It's just, yeah, they're not that easy to make these cases. It reminds me of, what's his name, Naim Hill. And we talked about on the show, like, how is this guy out of jail? Same question. When he was just in jail, and he beat the hell out of somebody almost to death while in jail. Yes. And that gets released from jail. It's ridiculous. Like, what does that make you feel? I just had a curiosity as a police chief. You know,

you would think after 27 years of doing this, it's just like, eh. It is what it is? It's not, it ain't is what it is though. Because you care. Right. Right? You care about people. In the day I don't anymore is the day I probably hang it up, you know? So yeah, I don't know.

I don't know why. It's they, he shouldn't have been out in my opinion. What's Chief Cotchis like about the 10th and Page neighborhood? He lives in the 10th and Page? I do live in the 10th and Page. Yeah. It's a great community. I'm going to the meeting tonight, you know, and I'm like, do I go as a resident or do

I go as a chief? Well, they want me to present, so. But what a great community. I mean, you know, if I'm out of town, like my neighbor will get my stuff from my porch that gets delivered and say, hey, chief, I'm going to hold on my neighbor will get my stuff from my porch that gets delivered, say, hey, chief, I'm going to hold on to your stuff, so someone will steal it off your porch or stuff. But we've had no issues there.

And it's just, I don't know, I love the community. The 10th and Page neighborhood, how have you seen it change in your two and a half years here? More students? Yeah, a lot of students. Yeah. More students? Yeah, a lot of students. Yeah, a lot of them do in residencies at the medical school. And a lot of folks who have lived there their entire life too. They own their homes, you know, it's been passed down.

And so, yeah, it's pretty cool to sit on the porch and have a conversation with someone who's lived there their entire life and kind of what was it like years you know years ago and Compared to now and how things change it's been it's really allowed me to have a better appreciation of the community This from Maria Marshall Barnes. Can chief conscious share his opinion on police officers and or SROs in schools? Yeah, so as you know City Council, I mean City Council school board Voted to bring SROs back to the schools. Great move. Yeah. So, and I supported that, obviously I've always said that, right, but I'm a cop.

So I get it, but I also wasn't here when they pulled them out of the school, so I'm sure a lot went into that decision as well. So you know, right now we're through, we had our first focus group on creating that MOU and what is the model gonna look like once that gets finalized and we have an idea of how many we're talking about and what does the model look like we gotta put a cost to it yeah something gonna pay for it yeah because I don't have them you gotta remember 2016 our allocated sworn strength was 130 sworn today it's 111 and I only have one vacancy.

So over the years with the mass exodus and all these things that were going on and you had all these vacancies, every budget season they, you know, pull some of them back. Okay, well we can't fill it anyway so let's, you know, which I make, which makes sense, I get it. But here we are. And so we want to do more now, they want us to do more and therefore, so I don't know, you know,

we got to figure that piece out too. Is there a mentality change with the SRO when it comes to policing versus an officer that's patrolling the streets? Oh, absolutely. Can you put that in perspective? I could think of some of my officers who I would never put in schools. And I could think of some of my officers

who would be wonderful in the schools. You got to have the right fit. The school will be involved in this decision, right? I said this during the focus group. I said I want all the principals there. Because at the end of the day, I want to know what do you want? That's your school, right? When my officers are in your school,

you're the chief of police, right? We don't, like, so what do you wanna see in this? Because I couldn't imagine, I mean, these principals deal with a lot, you know? And so, and they need some help. And so we're gonna come up with the right model that's unique to Charlottesville. We're gonna come up with the right model

for Charlottesville City Schools that everybody is okay with involved in that process. And then we'll make it work. This comment's come in, it's a good one. To Chief Cotchis's point, there was a study on DC that at any given time, it was 200 to 300 people responsible for 80% of the gun violence in the city. So 20 or 30 in Charlottesville sounds extremely plausible.

This comment has come in, it's election time and we have three council, we have two council spots that are up for grabs. Will Chief Kotchish share any thought on the election cycle and the candidates that are running? No. Smart man. Last thing you want is a police chief getting involved in that. But look, political season's here, right? I get it. And so certain things pop up and certain conversations that I have to be involved in there and there. But no, it's not my place to opine about politics. What's the interaction with the police department and city council?

I got to tell you, and I tell people this all the time, my time as chief in Warranty was 10 times harder than here. Small town politics and city councils in smaller towns are just, it's just ruthless. And here, again, I just think our council's thoughtful. They're focusing on important things like sidewalks, crosswalks, public safety, things, potholes, things that communities care about and I can appreciate that. And I do, I watch a lot of council meetings, not just our council.

I watch all the planning commission meetings, architectural review board meetings, the CRHA meetings. My wife wonders what's wrong with me. I just, I nerd out on government, right? But I think we have a really good thing going with this council. They're they're thoughtful and you know I appreciate working for I have a very good relationship with all of them and and they all have different things that you know they are passionate about but yeah I have no complaints. Have you had a

chance to talk with Jim Fleischer? I have not. Okay we got two spots up for grabs. Here's an interesting question. What does Chief Kotchess think about the all the money being spent on this new jail? I don't know enough about it other than I know it's a hot topic and so you know from my understanding the reasoning behind it is because it needs upgrades, right? I mean, we just talked about reentry, right? Well, how are we treating people when they're locked up? I mean, I think that matters as well, you know? Because you're not gonna get rehabilitated in jail

or prison, that just doesn't happen, you know? So that's why programs like the Bridge and other programs are so effective. So again, it would be irresponsible for me to really opine on that. I don't know enough about that. That was, you know, I know that there were one piece of that. A lot of the other jurisdictions are involved as well. But I know it's a hot topic.

What is the role with the police in the city in the houseless population that seems this is the viewer's words, continuing to plague Charlottesville? You know, I'm glad you asked me that question I was talking to a group last night about this and I kind of went off on a tangent, but I Think we have to get to a point where we you know, we talk about folks as homeless individuals or unhoused individuals What is the preferred nomenclature? How about Joe and Josie? Okay, because these folks have real names, okay, right? They're real people. Okay

And when you get to know them each one of them has their own story Okay, you know, I think so we need we can't lose the humanity in in what we're seeing I fall victim to that That's a fair point. I think a lot of people do I make that a lot of people do but I want to know who don't Who doesn't my cops? Okay, because they deal with these folks every day. They get to know them personally. Sometimes they'll buy them a hotel room. Sometimes they buy them lunch. Just this morning, you know, someone needed to keep, it was raining, they needed to keep their stuff, we let them keep their stuff in our lobby.

And so again, we can't lose the humanity in these things. It's a real challenge, right? There's a conversation about low barrier shelter on Cherry Avenue and it kept coming up about sex offenders, sex offenders, sex offenders. When they looked into it, there's like, of 200 or so unhoused individuals in the city, there's like three or four who are, like so, I just think we have to be really careful

about how we talk about human beings, right? And there's a lot of people are one paycheck away from being houseless, right? A lot of these folks, they age out of foster care. There's lots of reasons why people are unhoused. And I will tell you, this year, I came into my office right before Christmas time and I had a Christmas present on my desk

and it was from an unhoused couple. And it was a little makeshift thing that they made for me. And I gotta tell you, it's on my shelf. Because, like again, it reminds me that, you know, these are real people that we're dealing with. It's a challenge. And I can tell you, the city manager, it ain't a, it's not a meeting we don't have

that we're not talking about this topic. Why, what can you guys do if they're on the downtown mall? I've had this. Jerry, if I could figure that out, I probably won't be here because I'd be a very rich man. I had a conversation with a business owner that I respect that's been, and I tell the story often, I won't utilize her name. I know you know who she is, and when I tell the story, you'll be able to figure it out

who it is immediately. She has a business on the downtown mall that's been here for multiple generations, high end business. She has two houseless individuals that are sleeping under her, what's the storefront called, the awning? The vestibule, is that the word? Vestibule?

Yeah, her awning. And she had to make a deal with them. You can sleep here after hours overnight as long as there's no pee, no puke, no pooping here. Literally she says that to them. I don't care, but once my store's open, you gotta leave. And she's like, this is all I can do here. And she's like, I don't have any other solution.

I think your hands may be tied as well because this is actual like, correct me with the right terminology, someone's right to do this, right? It's a public park by definition, the downtown mall? I don't think it's considered a public park. A public right away. A public right away, okay.

But yeah, I think there are things that you could do. Obviously, if they're within your easement, I think you could probably trespass that person from there, right, if they're committing a crime, like urinating in public, stuff like that. We look into that and if charges are appropriate, we would charge. But yeah, you know, that's the other piece to this.

These business owners have put everything they've ever had into these businesses, you know, and they're just trying to make a living. And this can affect their business. You know, I concede that. And so we are working on a few things, some things I can't really talk about right now, but there are a few things that we are working on that... You probably hear this all the time, don't you?

Oh, yeah. This is one of the top five things you hear? Yeah, like I said, when I meet, there's not a meeting we have with the city manager that this doesn't come up because he is committed to doing something about this. And he's an outside the box thinker and he's going to... We'll get somewhere in it. Do I think, am I naive enough to think we're going to solve homelessness?

No, I'm not. I live in a world of reality. And so, but I think we can make some progress. Philip Dow, chief, we are so glad we have you here. You're doing a great job. One of the best communications directors I've ever seen, maybe give this guy a raise, Kyle Irvin watching the program.

I love you, Kyle. I love you, Kyle. I love you, Kyle. That was for you, Kyle. I'll throw a... He's a great guitar player from what I understand too. He's a great, dude, he's a renaissance man. Loves the outdoors. Yes, he does.

Loves a good cigar. And he answers his phone no matter what, no matter where he is. I'll call him, it'll be like a sundiser. He's in the middle of a mountain somewhere and he answers. In the woods. Yeah. Hell of a job. He's got his laptop in his bag.

Dealing with the media? Kyle, I sincerely mean that. All right, we'll wind down the interview with this. What do you job. He's got his laptop in his bag. Dealing with the media? I sincerely mean that. All right. We'll wind down the interview with this. What do you make of the low barrier shelter on Cherry? You think that's a good spot for it? I mean, where's a good spot?

Yeah, it's a tough part. These are tough things, Jerry. Right? And it's so... I think it's a great spot for it. Yeah. I mean... It's on the transportation line.

It's in the heart of the city. You can get to UVA, you can get anywhere. Yeah. I think some people would agree, some people would disagree, obviously. The neighborhood disagrees. And you're gonna see that anywhere you go. So where do you put it?

Right. And so that's why sometimes tough decisions have to be made. And it's not my place to say where a low barrier shelter should be. The city manager and the city council will make that decision and I'll make sure it's safe Final question for you. This is a great one here chief conscious may I ask your age? I think you are older than you actually look and then she also adds this question here How long does chief conscious have here in Charlottesville with us? We're lucky to have it off. I'll answer the last one first

I'm we talked about this. I ain't going over. I'm here, man. I've already retired once. When I'm done here, I'm done. And so I'm fortunate each and every day to be able to lead this organization and work with just awesome, think about this, Jerry. We are hiring 21 year old kids,

sending them to an academy for six months. Where's the academy? In Wires Cave. Really? Yep. Okay. And they come back and we expect them to be perfect. And they're doing this job, what I didn't have to do when I was on the street, with a camera strapped

to their chest, taking pictures frame by frame of everything they do. And God help them if they make a mistake. With social media and everybody having cameras and stuff? I don't know if I could do the job now. I really don't know. And so, man, I'm just really fortunate and I love what I do each and every day as for my age I'm 50 okay 50 years old there we go chief

conscious you killed this it was amazing interview I'm hurt man my knees hurt I can I can agree with being you know knees hurting and stuff like that but this guy's got a zest for life and we are I will concur with the viewers and listeners lucky to have him and I've said this many times on the show that if this guy wanted to do anything in Charlottesville the community would roll out the red carpet for him. If he wanted to be the mayor if you want to be a nonprofit the private sector people would roll out the red carpet for him and I will also make this. In the last two and a half years,

I don't think anyone has had a more significant impact on Charlottesville in the last two and a half years. I mean, give me one where he started what he was given when he started. We're not gonna go down this road here, but the previous police chief was suing the city, ladies and gentlemen, and had the city in a department and a brand, a state of brand,

that was one of distrust. And look at what he's rebuilt. I mean, it's impressive. I'm grateful for your time. I'm seriously grateful. We went an hour. Thank you. All right. Thank you. Thanks, Jerry. Chief Mike Kochis, guys, on the I Love Seville Show. That's all she wrote. We'll be back in the saddle at 10, 15 a.m. tomorrow with Today Imanana and of course the I Love Seaville show at 12 30 for Chief Kochis and the fabulous Judah Wickauer who wears the button down shirt and the sweater in the middle of summer. Yeah what is that? He gets cold Chief. All right. He gets cold. Don't have heat in this place? We have Chief. I'm wearing a short. For Judah and Mike Kochis, I'm Jerry Miller. So long, everybody. Great. Thank you..