IT isn’t really a sacrifice because in the first place, it’s their job – keeping an eagle eye out for criminals and assorted vermins on the streets and responding with reasonable force and determination when an offense is being committed. Still we must commend the policemen and policewomen , the Blue-Greys, pounding the beat in Dagupan’s main streets at all hours of the day, in hot weather or mid afternoon downpour, for just being there.

You must have seen them, the uniformed ones walking in pairs down Perez Boulevard or A.B. Fernandez, making themselves very visible. Their roving presence gives added secure feeling to pedestrians and storeowners with whom some of the fresh-looking young cops on foot patrol take time to greet and do some idle talk every now and then before moving on. It helps that the cops chosen for the beat patrol by City Cop Chief Ed Basbas and Provincial Police Director Alan Purisima are generally of the smiling faces and happy gait types – not the brash, pot-bellied, slow, unfriendly looking old hands who instill an uneasy, if suspicious feeling in the ordinary downtown walker even without their meaning to.

Someone must give a feedback to PNP Chief Art Lomibao for this great and long due masterstroke in police-community relations.

* * * *

Even as we say this, we can only wonder if Public Order and Safety Office chief Robert Erfe-Mejia can still do something about some of his “Orange Boys” — no, not about their generally ashen color and less appealing countenance and their fondness for wearing shades; that’s all between them and their mothers or girlfriends, we guess – who seem to be growing more haughty and aloof with each year that passes. If only the POSO can install secret eavesdropping devices on public jeepneys, they’d get a good earful of what’s being said about their operatives behind their backs. We can assure them it’s not at all flattering.

In surprise contrast, many drivers now are even giving guarded praises for the regular cops while reserving some acidic comments for the Orange Boys – frankly we don’t know if the Boys Of Robert are doing a good, make that very good, job of enforcing the laws and regulations (and therefore, and quite understandably, earning their ire) or the reverse, making a mess of their jobs while clandestinely earning on the side (and therefore, and again quite understandably, earning their ‘clients’ spite)

Don’t get us wrong, we do appreciate the general efforts of these quasi-official traffic enforcers at bringing discipline among motorists on Dagupan streets and roads, freeing the regular policemen from the chore as it is to do real police work. We can even name or identify some of them Orange Guys who epitomize good public service – courteous, uncomplaining, and alert – while manning their posts.

But as with any bundle or bushel of tomatoes, there are rotten ones who are obviously into the job only for the glamour (?) and authority of it, hardly for creditable public service. And if Robert hasn’t spotted these characters from within his “shock troops” by now and given them less public exposure (lest they do more damage outside), maybe he should be riding public transportation oftener to learn much more than any set and contrived meeting at his office could ever teach him by way of internal discipline for his wards.