According to this article (in German) the German Federal Police - or as the K-Landnews calls them, the German Federales - doesn't have enough officers volunteer for registering refugees.
That in itself is not alarming, you'd expect law enforcement to be stretched to the limits with many thousand newcomers arriving in the country each day.
We find it very positive that the Federales have up until now been giving this job to members of the force on a voluntary basis. This self selection will certainly get you a great number of the more friendly and open minded members of the force in front of refugees.
We don't know the latest details of the financial and overtime regulations for this temporary duty but such officers will get a per diem if they work away from their normal beat, and they will accumulate overtime which can be taken as vacation or at least partly in cash. Extra cash makes activities like this interesting for officers who have substantial mortgage payments, too.
Pretty much the same situation and incentives as on any big city police force in the U.S., where the blogster has worked major public events with cops who were there for the overtime.
So, now the Federales are running out of volunteers, and we might expect that officers get simply posted to the various ports of entry and train stations where refugees arrive. Indeed, the article says that officers will be posted even if they don't want to, with exemptions for single parents, handicapped officers, and personnel who take care of needy family members.
Now, racist German Federales may find themselves pulling duty in the "refugees welcome" areas of the country. The force has a pretty decent overall reputation, though issues have been reported concerning mistreatment or abuse of foreigners in the context of racial profiling as well as violence against asylum seekers, such as this incident (in German) of alleged violence against an asylum seeker in a holding cell.
The head of the German police union section for the Federal Police is concerned for well being of the officers in registration duty: Looking into the eyes of desperate refugees for eight hours a day for several months is mentally challenging. You don't just absorb that, says the union rep and follows up his observation with a call for shorter shifts, more free time, and better accommodation. Such measure would certainly bring up volunteer numbers, the union man says.
He adds the Chancellor has called for flexibility, the Interior Minister should now show some of that.
It's such a lovely quote.
The interior ministry is working on fixes, including using customs officers to do refugee registration duty. To the K-Landnews, that seems a great idea because German customs has undergone some two decades of "job enrichment" as a result of much of its earlier work disappearing with the free movement of people and goods in the "Schengen area" of the European union.
These days, German customs - still carrying guns - process the German motor vehicle tax and hunt down suspected illegal workers.
Note that handing over vehicle tax processing to a federal agency had the interesting fringe benefit of creating a federal vehicle database.
Looking for illegals, of which there are no more than an estimated 50 000 or so, has turned out to be a great way to find German or EU workers moonlighting in vulnerable sectors like construction. Lo and behold, we even had a customs uniform pop up on foot, as rare in the German countryside as a red footed toad, at our abode during major work on the new roof. The officer headed right past the blogster covered head to toe in white stucco for a long chat with the last of the workmen of the construction company.
That, of course, can be excused because the fully stuccoed blogster was as white as it possibly gets that day, while the roofer sported the deep tan you get from being so much closer to the sun up there on the roofs of the land.
Anyway, we hope the Federales can maintain their welcoming attitude for as long as needed.
[Update 10/18/2015] "As long as needed" appears to mean "a couple of months" to the chief of the German police union. In an interview today, he calls for a border fence to Austria.
While we are at it, please not the reporting convention regarding border fences. When a socialist/communist/dictator-run country builds a border fence, call it Iron Curtain or something else that sounds violent.
When a democracy builds a border fence, call it "border fence".
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