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TAKE HANDCUFFS OFF COMMISH

ABILITY TO PICK HIS LEADERSHIP TEAM'S A MUST

IMAGINE taking a job running a troubled corporation with thousands of employees and being charged with turning it around. Only hitch is, you can hire only five people to help you do it. All other hires are done by another governing body, and based pretty much solely on test scores - not on qualifications like leadership abilities or management vision.

That's going to be the dilemma facing the city's next police commissioner.

Besides the next mayor, there's arguably no other job as important to the city and its future than the person who replaces Commissioner Sylvester Johnson when he retires at the end of the year.

And while there may be other departments more in need of fixing, there are few with as many obstacles to reform. For one, its restrictive civil- service rules are unrivaled by most major cities in the country. For another, the Police Department is, by nature, an insular and insulated department that rarely welcomes scrutiny. Plus, its powerful union resists the idea of expanding the commissioner's hiring power.

But reforming the department is a priority. And the commissioner's ability to build a loyal and qualified team is one of the keys to meaningful change.

Allowing the commissioner to choose his management team will require a change to the city charter, which in turn requires a popular two-thirds majority vote. For practical purposes, it will also require buy-in from the Fraternal Order of Police. As we head into a year in which city contracts are set to be negotiated, that means the stakes are raised on all contracts and changes like this one.

Given those high political stakes, we can't imagine any City Council member elbowing colleagues to be the first to champion this charter change. (Former Mayor Ed Rendell was the last to try to change the charter, unsuccessfully.) For that job, we'd nominate Councilman-at-large Frank Rizzo, who has the legislative and family cred to take it on.

We hope he considers it. And while he's at it, the pre-employment residency requirement for police needs overhaul. Now, people interested in joining the police have to have resided in the city for a year before even applying. Even loosening that restriction for military personnel could be helpful. If we're serious about the police role in fighting crime, let's unlock the handcuffs that keep them from building the best department possible. *