Chapter 5 Flashcards
Community policing is a philosophy that does this to the role of police in society.
Broadens
This model of police administration has its roots in the London Metropolitan Force in London.
Military or Bureaucratic
The German sociologists Max Weber, was the first to outline the principles of orgainzation. Weber studied (1) these two organizations to understand why complex organizations were effective.
- the church
2. the Army
What is a negative side effect of the principle of hierarchy?
Communication is inhibited wheras orders and commands flow down to the bottom of the department, but little information is passed upward
What is a negative side effect of specialization or the division of labor?
Units often fail to coordinate their activities or work together when tackling complex problems
What is a negative side effect of official policies and procedures (or rulification)?
Failure to use innovative solutions to problems to concentrate on procedures as opposed to solving problems.
What is a negative side effect of recorded decisions?
Too much emphasis is paced on enduring that the documents are properly completed and recorded while actual police work may be neglected.
What is a negative side effect on positional authority?
It often does not recognize the ability or expertise of lower-level subordinates who may be able to contribute to the solution of the problems.
These organizations are more open and delegate higher levels of responsibility at the operational levels of the organization.
Organic organizations
Organic organizations delegate decision making to the lowest level in the organization. Unit commanders, rather than top administrators, should be making decisions about priorities and which problems have a higher priority. This is best accomplished through these, where officers of all ranks meet yo discuss problems.
Vertical staff meetings
This type of planning simply is the identification of goals and objuectives, and a determination of how they will be achieved?
Strategic planning
Strategic planning in the traditional police department generally has two components. What are they?
- First, the department tends to respond to crime and calls of servoce as it has traditionally,
- Second, the department reacts when a significant problem arises.
In addition to obtaining information from the jurisdiction’s elected officials, police administrators should solicit information from all sorts of citizens within the community including: (5)
- civic organizations
- business leaders
- community leaders
- neighborhood groups
- individuals
There are several mechanisms available to the police administrator that can be used to facilitate communications with the community, They include: (3)
- Neighborhood Counsels
- Chief’s Advisory Committee
- Special Committees
Neighborhood Counsels–These counsels often are comprised of leaders such as:
a. religious leaders,
b. business people,
c. community activists, and
d. ordinary citizens who have community concerns.
These provide feedback on what are the most pertinent problems in a neighborhood and neighborhood expectations of the police.
Neighborhood Counsels
Committee members should represent large diverse constituences. Such a committee can provide broad based opinions and ideas about community problems and police initiatives. What type of committee does this describe?
Chief’s Advisory Committee
These committees are generally devoted to a particular problem or area. What type of committee does this describe?
Special Committee
police administrators should attempt to improve communications within the department. As such there are several vehicles that can be used including: (3)
- Command or Administrative Staff Meetings (at a minimum, they should occur weekly)
- Quality Circles
- Unit Meetings
These are formed to deal with significant problems in the department such as use of force, increase in auto thefts, or change in policies?
Quality Circles
The most effective way of collating the information is by:
Geography
It is a managerial process that uses crime analysis information. It consists of periodic meetings, usually weekly or monthly, where unit commanders and management staff are assembled to discuss crime problems. The foundation of the meetings is crime maps showing the crimes and crime trends in various patrol areas:
COMPSTAT
The COMPSTAT process also consists of a comprehensive reporting system whereby crime information is shared by all participants in New York consisting of three distinct, weekly reports:
- The COMPSTATE Report (which provides a ranking of the precincts by crime and arrests)
- The Commander Profile Report (serves as a report card on how managers are dealing with their crime problems and their units)
- The Crime Mapping Report (provides commanders with visual accounts of crime and calls of service in their commands)
A deficiency in many of the current COMPSTAT programs is that the analysis and discussions center exclusively on this:
Crime statistics
The current COMPSTAT system presents three problems:
- it deems citizen and community inout as being irrevelant
- problems identified through citizen input may be more important or critical
- merging citizen input with crime analysis and COMPSTAT data may result in a comprehensive understanding of crime problems and the identification of more effective solutions
Supervision is the key to the successful implementation of community policing, and administrators must ensure that middle managers and supervisors understand and embarce it. This is best achieved through:
- training
2. policies
3. direction
Engel has identified four distinct types or styles of police supervisors:
- the Traditional Supervisors (expects aggressive policing from subordinates)
- Innovative Supervisors (embrace community policing)
- Supportive Supervisors (relationship oriented)
- Active Supervisors (very active-making arrests, writing citations, as well as supervising officers)
Community policing often fails because of resistance from:
- line officers
- managers
- police unions
- specialized units
Police departments that are committed to community policing should attempt to select and train supervisors in the:
Innovative style
These meetings can be used as a technology transfer and organizatinoal develomental tool:
COMPSTAT
One aspect of community policing that has received insufficient attention is:
Implementation
There appear to be 8 steps in the change process that should occur or be approximated when implementing community policing: (8)
- Performance gap
- Recognize a need for change
- Creating a proper climate for change
- Diagnosing the problem
- Identifying alternative strategies
- Selecting the strategy
- Determining and operationalizing implementattion strategy
- Evaluating and modifying the strategy
This refer to a situation where the department’s performance does not match citizen expectations.
Performance gap
This relates to actions whereby admnistrators prepare and sell change to departmental constituents, perceptions, values, and commitments must be changed throughout the chain of command.
Creating the proper climate for change
Changing values is not definitive; they must be unannounced change in departmental goals, reward-punishment systems, mangement, supervision, personnel practices, and leadership. Sparrow summarizes the extent to which change must be implemented:
- Most talented and promising personnel into newly defined jobs
- Making it clear that route to promotion lies within such jobs
- Disbanding those squads and body and add weight to the traditional values
- Re-catagorizing the crime statistics according totheir effect on the community
- Redesigning the staff evaluation system to take account of contributions to the nature and quality of community life
- Providing in-service training and problem solving skills for veteran officers and managers
- Altering the nature of the training given to new recruits to include problem solving skills
- Establishing new communication channels with other public services
- A contracting for annual community surveys for a period of years
Actions which should prepare a department for community policing: (4)
- breaking down barriers to change
- educating its leaders and rank-and-file members for CP
- reassuring members CP has not been imported from outside but was an outgrowth of programs already in place
- reduce the likelihood that members will reject as foreign or not appropriate
Basically there are 2 strategis for implementing CP: piecemeal strategies and comprehensive strategies. This model attemots to introduce CP concepts and techniques through the department.
The Comprehensive Model
Basically there are 2 strategies for implementing CP: piecemeal strategies and comprehensive strategies,. This approach introduces it to a specialized unit charged with CP throughout the community or area that supplants traditional policing.
The Piecemeal Approach
Toch and Grant used this term to describe units that were out of the mainstream. In their worst for, such units becomes ridiculed, criticized, and undermined by other units or personnel.
Innovative ghettos
Walsh found four major stumbling blocks for officers involved in community policing: (4)
- lackof support and understanding from supervisors and officers
- minimal managerial support
- no job descriptions for CP officers and supervisors
- no policy or directives regarding community policing
These people have the responsibility of monitoring and evaluating community policing once its in place. They must identify any irregularities or problems and ensure operatinal corrections are made.
Middle and upper management
Once CP is implemented, administration must take measures toensure that it becomaes institutionalized. They must develop this type of structure which will continously encourage officers touse community policing.
A reward and reinforcement structure
Officers should have what percentage of their patrol time committed to engage the community.
30-40 %
How can a Police Department’s organization be altered to meet the needs of community policing?
- First, police leadership must be changed. Police administrators must be committed to community policing.
- Second, community policing consists of two very important elements: community partnerships and problem solving. These two elements must permeate that apartment from top to bottom.
- Third, the police department must change its culture. This means that a department must examine its policies and procedures to ensure they facilitate and encourage community policing.
The first step of any problem-solving effort should be to:
prioritze crime and disorder problems
Weisburd and his colleagues found that the concentration of crime in hotspots is fairly stable over time. Also, there are different types of hotspots (4):
- Street drug markets
- Gun violence
- Violent crime
- Crime and disorder
Community policing often fails because of resistance from:
- line officers,
- managers,
- police unions,
- specialized units
The most appropriate style of leadership when implementing and sustaining community policing is:
transformational leadership
This is a process where “the leader attempts to broaden the onterests and horzons of subordinats and move the organization in new direction”.
transformational leadership
Schermerhorn has identified the elements of transformational leadership (5):
- IT REQUIRES THAT THE LEADER HAVE A VISION..
The vision must consist of a sense of direction; this direction must be indicated to the organization. - THE LEADER MUST HAVE CHARISMA, OR THE ABILITY TO MOTIVATE AND INSPIRE others toward accomplishing objectives.
- SYMBOLISM IS IMPORTANT.. Whether it is the creation of new units, or commendations, the organization must have visible vestges of the new direction-community policing.
- SUBORDINATES MUST BE EMPOWERED to become involved in the new strategy, including self-motivation as well as direction from top administrators.
- THE LEADER MUST HAVE INTEGRITY. This means the leader must be open and honest about changes.
