"This is a down payment on my promise to add 1,000 police officers to the beat," Emanuel said in a news release before a press conference at a police station in the Auburn-Gresham neighborhood. "We cannot beat crime without more officers on the beat."

During the campaign, Emanuel promised to put 1,000 additional officers on the streets. Some of them would be shifted from desk jobs and some would be new hires.

The 400 or so officers from the two specialized units already were on the street, however.

Ald. Latasha Thomas, 17th, said she expects her ward to benefit in the short term as the 500 officers are redeployed in time for the summer. But she also noted Emanuel's campaign pledge.



"I want to see a plan about the thousand," Thomas said after the news conference. "I still think it's a thousand, because these are officers already on the books, right?"

Emanuel's announcement confirms what the Tribune first reported last night.

For 90 days, an estimated 450 of those officers will leave two specialized units -- the Mobile Strike Force and Targeted Response Unit -- and transfer to some of the most dangerous districts on the South and West sides. The balance will be pulled from various other units within the department.

Calling the move an indication of "a shift in management philosophy," acting Police Supt. Garry McCarthy said today it's important to put resources in the districts, "where the rubber meets the road."

Districts getting the extra manpower are Grand Crossing, South Chicago, Calumet, Gresham, Englewood and Chicago Lawn districts, one of the sources said. The two districts on the West Side getting more officers are the Harrison and Austin districts, the source said.

Of the 500, 400 of the officers will go the high-crime districts. The other 100 will be distributed to the five larger police areas and the local brass can determine how to use them to combat crime hot spots.



The source described the 90-day reassignments -- the longest duration of time the department can detail officers to other units without their consent -- as an evaluation period for Acting Superintendent Garry McCarthy to decide whether the officers’ presence on district patrol is more effective in areas with a high crime rate than if they were working in the Mobile Strike Force and Targeted Response Unit.