INTRODUCTION - by Chief Harry Dolan

A commitment to change

We suspect that most citizens reading our strategic plan will immediately want to ask three important questions:

• What is community policing?
• Why does it make sense for Grand Rapids?
• And why now?

Implementing the Trojanowicz Philosophy

It was more than six years ago when I heard the late Dr. Robert Trojanowicz talk about how the police cannot do the job alone but must harness the power of the community as partners. "Trojo," the National Center for Community Policing at Michigan State University, was recognized nationwide for his pioneering efforts in promoting community policing as a department-wide philosophy and not just an add-on program.

Robert Trojanowicz

Trojanowicz’ Nine P’s of Community Policing [included in Community Policing: How To Get Started, co-authored with policing.com’s Bonnie Bucqueroux (Anderson Publishing, Cincinnati, OH, 1998)] remains one of the clearest and most complete explanations of what community policing is and what it can do:

• PHILOSOPHY - The community policing philosophy rests on the belief that contemporary challenges require the police to provide full-service policing, proactive and reactive, by involving the community directly as partners in the process of identifying, prioritizing, and solving problems including crime, fear of crime, illicit drugs, social and physical disorder, and neighborhood decay. A department-wide commitment implies changes in policies and procedures.

• PERSONALIZED - By providing the community its own community officer, community policing breaks down the anonymity on both sides — community officers and community residents know each other on a first-name basis.

• POLICING - Community policing maintains a strong law enforcement focus; community officers and teams answer calls and make arrests like any other officer, but they also focus on proactive problem solving.

• PATROLS - Community officers and teams work and patrol their communities, but the goal is to free them from the isolation of the patrol car, often by having them walk the beat or rely on other modes of transportation, such as bicycles, scooters, or horses.

• PERMANENT - Community policing rests on assigning community officers and teams permanently to defined beats, so that they have the time, opportunity, and continuity to develop the new partnership. Permanence means that community officers should not be rotated in and out of their beats, and they should not be used as "fill-ins" for absences and vacations of other personnel.

• PLACE - All jurisdictions, no matter how large, ultimately break down into distinct neighborhoods. Community policing decentralizes police officers, often including investigators, so that community officers can benefit from "owning" their neighborhood beats in which they can act as a catalyst for community-based problem solving, tailoring the response to the needs and resources of the beat area. Moreover, community policing decentralizes decision-making, not only by allowing community officers the autonomy and freedom to act, but also by empowering all officers to participate in community-based problem solving.

• PROACTIVE - As part of providing full-service policing, community policing balances reactive responses to crime incidents and emergencies with a proactive focus on preventing problems before they occur, escalate, or spread.

• PARTNERSHIP - Community policing encourages a new partnership between people and their police, which rests on mutual respect, civility, and support.

• PROBLEM SOLVING - Community policing redefines the mission of the police to focus on community building and solving problems, so that success or failure depends on qualitative outcomes (problems solved) rather than just on quantitative results (arrests made, citations issued — so-called "incident-driven/numbers policing").

Trojo always said that he learned community policing at the knee of his father, a beat cop in Bay City with an eighth-grade education. Bob would often tell me, "My job is to use my Ph.D. to add credibility to reinventing the role of the old-fashioned beat cop as today’s community-based problem solver."

Bob would always caution that implementing this new form of personalized and decentralized policing requires balancing planning with action. "Think of it like maintaining the tension on your line when you are fishing – reel it in too fast and you can snap the line, but go too slowly and you don’t land the fish." Which is why the strategic plan that you hold in your hands outlines bold milestones spread over the next five years.

Why does community policing make sense for Grand Rapids and why now?

Community policing works! Why Grand Rapids? Because this amazing city is uniquely forward-thinking and eager to set the standard for the next milennium. Why now? Because it is time to take community policing to the next level, by implementing it as part of community-oriented government. The Neighborhood Police Service Centers are rooted in concepts that Trojo outlined to me shortly before his death, and it is for us, his disciples, to work hard in our communities to make that vision a reality. As Trojo always said, "Until we are all safe, no one is truly safe." I am fortunate and honored to be in a position to state that Bob Trojanowicz was a valued mentor and trusted friend.

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