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Police car worries spread across AZ

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Tucson's fleet administrator Gary Lowe said he can't understand why Ford Motor Co. won't replace the power-steering pumps in all its affected police cruisers nationwide "because it's such an easy fix."

"It's a $100 pump," Lowe said. "This is probably one of the easiest fixes I've seen on a police vehicle. I don't understand why they're balking."

But for Ford to replace all the pumps in the country, the cost would be exponentially higher — between $11 million and $17 million, based on a Ford-estimated 57,000 cars with the smaller pump nationwide.

With Ford rejecting wholesale replacement of the pumps, a dozen Arizona law enforcement agencies, including the Tucson and Phoenix police departments, the Pima County Sheriff's Department and the state Department of Public Safety, have been doing it themselves.

Spending the $200 to $300 it costs, including labor, to change out the steering pumps for larger ones was the only prudent thing to do, said Marana Sgt. Bill Derfus.

Although the steering hesitation caused by Ford's use of a smaller power-steering pump in its 2006-07 Crown Victoria police interceptors is momentary, Derfus said it has the potential to cause accidents.

"From a municipality's perspective, we couldn't take that chance," Derfus said.

Liability and safety concerns prompted Flagstaff to make the change, said Richard McGaugh, Flagstaff's fleet supervisor. "We can't have our officers out in a car that potentially has steering problems," he said.

Although $11 million to $17 million may not seem huge for a multibillion-dollar corporation, Ford lost $12.7 billion last year — the biggest yearly loss in its history, according to company reports. Ford's bonds were downgraded to junk in mid-2005 by the rating service Standard & Poor's.

Ford spokesman Dan Jarvis said Ford will change the pumps if police notice a problem with any individual vehicle, provided the dealer verifies the problem. Otherwise, there would be no reason to change the pump, Jarvis said.

Jarvis even took issue with using the word "fix" to describe the pump change because he said it suggests there is a problem when nothing is wrong.

If there were a recall, Tucson personal-injury attorney Louis Hollingsworth said Ford stands to lose more than just the cost to replace the pumps. The hit in reputation, "hurts not only the Crown Vic but Ford in general," Hollingsworth said.

"Ford is taking a calculated risk," because the cost of any litigation against the company is less expensive than the total cost of a recall, Hollingsworth said. If there were a catastrophic accident involving one of the cars, he said, Ford would be in the position of knowing about the problem with the Crown Victoria police package and knowing the types of situations in which they're used.

Even if Ford is willing to take that risk, Hollingsworth said, from a risk management perspective it's something cities and towns should avoid by repairing the cars.