The Importance Of Community Policing

High Visibility Recent Events

Several high profile incidents occurring a a span of less than a year, given extensive media coverage, have incited a new round of heated debates, national movements and the formation of a presidential commission to investigate police policies across the United States. The appearance of an uptick in perceived police misconduct has created a backlash against police. Ronald Weitzer (2015) noted that, “public confidence in the police typically erodes after a controversial incident is heavily publicized in the news media.” (p.475) The drop in opinion typically recovers though. Weitzer goes further and concedes, “in Los Angeles, approval ratings reverted to their pre-King levels four years after his beating, eroded

Even the word community has been blurred. Community can, depending on the context, refer to everything from a specific neighborhood, city, or another area drawn on a map; it can also represent a group with common characteristics, interests or a population. It is best to adopt an understanding that community policing is not a set process, or function, but a philosophy that has to remain highly flexible.

Initiatives undertaken are also widely varying. Some of the more common are reverting back to foot patrols, placing officers back into regular direct contact with the public; and establishing “ministrations”, substations, or “storefront” stations. Efforts have also been even less conventional, with police involved in producing newsletters, assisting in establishing neighborhood watches, organizing and supervising youth activities, or conducting joint police-citizen patrols.

One of the earliest form of community policing was “team policing” which emphasized collaboration between police and “problem” neighborhoods. As the concept developed it grew into Problem Oriented Policing, or POP. POP signaled a shift from addressing criminal activities to the underlying problems present in the communities that lead to crime. (Ray