This article originally appeared in the July 2023 Police1 Leadership Briefing. To read the full briefing, see Creating a PD family culture; 5 police-community partnership examples and add the Leadership Briefing to your subscriptions.
Partnerships in public safety are the framework of success. Several key ingredients are needed to create these partnerships. Participants must be willing to create respectful and trusting environments for authentic conversation. Everyone involved should be able to share their beliefs about the strengths and challenges of their community. Participants want to be seen, heard, valued and respected.
Public safety leaders must encourage a willing mindset within their organization to work collaboratively with community partners of all identities and backgrounds – this is the first step toward success. The specific needs of municipalities may differ, but there are basic principles for successful and sustainable partnerships in public safety.
Community engagement builds trust
Community policing initiatives are foundational for any successful crime-reduction model. Law enforcement and the community need to create reliable and trusting relationships to build connections. The beginning of a successful partnership requires honesty and transparency.
An effective gateway for this is the practice of community engagement. This requires law enforcement to create strategies to build confidence in its citizens. Events and occasions need to reach all aspects of the community, ensuring there is diverse distribution of communication strategies. This guarantees the application of resources toward the needs of everyone, not just a few. Building trust within our communities requires such engagement before enacting formal partnerships.
Collaborate with community members
Creating meaningful and trusting partnerships requires that law enforcement and its citizens understand the difference between community engagement and community policing. Community engagement is based on nonenforcement encounters by law enforcement and citizens to create a rapport. This is the starting point for developing trust and open communication but only the beginning of creating a partnership. This is where the foundation of community policing strategies begins.
The Justice Department’s Office of Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS) defines community policing as a “philosophy that promotes organizational strategies that support the systematic use of partnerships and problem-solving techniques to proactively address the immediate conditions that give rise to public safety issues such as crime, social disorder and fear of crime.”
Partnerships between law enforcement and the community require the initial interactions that allow for conversations that build into relationships. It is at that point that collaborations commence and move forward.
Engaging citizens from all aspects of the community will help agencies understand where resources are needed and give the community a voice in crime-reduction strategies. The International Association of Chiefs of Police released training key No. 706, which describes how community collaboration fits into the President’s Task Force on 21st Century Policing: “Law enforcement agencies should collaborate with community members to develop policies and strategies in communities and neighborhoods disproportionately affected by crime for deploying resources that aim to reduce crime by improving relationships, greater community engagement and cooperation.”
Engagement in action
Law enforcement leaders and individual officers can generate informal nonenforcement actions that lead to formal teams. The Salisbury (North Carolina) Police Department has various engagement groups that have led to long-lasting relationships with its community. These associations have led to partnerships that assist in the department’s stratified policing model and overall citizen satisfaction.
Here are five examples of partnerships in action:
- Salisbury Neighborhood Action Group: Once a month, the Salisbury Police Department hosts a meeting of SNAG – the Salisbury Neighborhood Action Group. City leaders, department personnel, business owners, civic organizations, local students and citizens are invited to these meetings to discuss criminal issues, code enforcement issues, strengths and weaknesses of the city. Information is shared with everyone who attends, and potential solutions are discussed.
- Crime reduction and beautification initiatives: Recently, the Salisbury Police Department was awarded a Byrne Criminal Justice Innovation Grant. This led to the partnership of multiple community and city leaders working together toward crime reduction and beautification initiatives. An action plan was developed based on the results of a community survey to determine the greatest needs of the city. The goal is to enhance safety, create a sense of sustainable community networks and provide resources to as many diverse groups as possible in Salisbury’s West End neighborhood. Many police-driven intervention strategies are short-term and lack sustainability. The grant leverages the community to keep the momentum of the work going and creates a sense of ownership to sustain the project.
- Project Safe Neighborhood: Salisbury Police Department also embraces Project Safe Neighborhood (PSN), which implements various community resources to provide opportunities for high-risk offenders. It promotes officers who actively work with the community and engage with those struggling within the system to resolve issues before they become more significant. The most important component for collaboration in PSN is reentry simulations, intended to educate providers on how difficult it is for someone getting released from prison to reenter society.
- Neighborhood Ice Cream Express: At the Salisbury Police Department, the Neighborhood Ice Cream Express (NICE) is operated by police officers and travels into various neighborhoods and apartment complexes and attends events where officers pass out free ice cream and connect with citizens. It is an informal engagement opportunity that brings citizens and officers together for conversations, which creates a calm and fun atmosphere for fellowship. There are additional, less-formal options for community engagement like Coffee with a Cop, which joins citizens and officers in a safe environment to get to know one another and informally ask questions and gather feedback.
- Cease Fire: An example of community policing as a public safety partnership is a program entitled Cease Fire. Introduced in 2019 in Salisbury, it began as a local initiative to encourage Salisbury youth, and in some cases adults, to stop gun-related assaults during the summer months. The program utilizes data and analytics to address gun violence and crime in specific communities, in partnership with community stakeholders, the Salisbury Police Department and the Salisbury-Rowan branch of the NAACP. Team members work as de-escalators amid potentially violent situations between related groups in the community. Cease Fire now engages its citizens year-round. Other examples of such crime-reduction initiatives include community watch programs, crime prevention through environmental design divisions, and business and residential security surveys with follow-up action plans.
No matter which ideas law enforcement utilizes, engagement with your citizens will increase transparency and develop community collaborations. It is paramount that law enforcement takes the time to cultivate these relationships intentionally and assess whom they partner with and why. The phrase “community partnerships” typically raises the idea of warm, like-minded people collaborating towards a common goal. However, these relationships can have their share of obstacles. That is why choosing partners wisely is so important.
Cast a broad net
In addition to collaborating with citizens, public safety leaders should also always try to include other resources for partnership. Collaboration should extend beyond community input. The inclusion of mental health professionals and social workers in law enforcement activities can benefit community relationships. To reduce crime there is a need to address those struggling with homelessness and/or addiction. Also, officers and staff can use various mental health resources for mental wellness check-ups or tragic call situations.
In 2017, North Carolina’s Mocksville Police Department, local civic leaders, the district attorney’s office, Daymark Recovery Services and the Mt. Zion Community Church partnered to create a program called SAFE (Substance Abuse Family Education). It was initiated as the result of an overdose death in the town. SAFE team members became certified in life coaching and as “smart recovery” facilitators. The team worked with addicts who struggled in the judicial system. Their goal was to get them the life resources they and their families needed. The team also provided public presentations to educate the community about addiction and what resources were available.
As the saying goes, “It takes a village.” With that in mind, law enforcement leadership must rely on a committed ideology of community policing. Law enforcement is not capable of solving all the problems within a community alone; however, if partnerships between public safety and their communities are effective, the outcome can be monumental in reducing crime and improving relations. The relationships between law enforcement entities and individual communities are uniquely complicated. Law enforcement, community members, stakeholders and other resource groups must be willing to make changes together and trust one another to create successful partnerships for the safety of our communities.
NEXT: A strong foundation: Community policing strategies to build trust
