Chief Ed Davis Interview

Bernard Melekian Intro:
This is ?The Beat,? a podcast series that keeps you in the know about the latest community policing topics facing our nation.

Katherine McQuay:
This is Katherine McQuay with the COPS Office, and today we are joined by Commissioner Ed Davis with the Boston Police Department.  Chief Davis, thank you so much for being with us today.

Chief Ed Davis:
It?s a pleasure, Katherine.

Katherine McQuay:
And we wanted to talk to you about the importance of the interaction between law enforcement and the citizens they serve, and I wondered if you could say a bit about that.

Chief Ed Davis:
Certainly.  It?s of great concern to police chiefs and commissioners across the country, and we?re continually working with our officers to improve that interaction.  Sometimes we speak about that interaction in terms of customer service, and I think rightfully so police officers don?t understand the importance of it.  They believe it?s less critical to some of the more critical and important things they do day in and day out, like arresting people and enforcing a law, so when you start to talk about customer service, sometimes you lose the officers? attention.

But I think it?s important to know that police officers have an awesome amount of power, an awesome amount of responsibility to enforce the law.  They can take people?s liberty away from them.  And in some cases, they take people?s lives.  And I think that when you consider that situation and that fact, you really have to look at that interaction as something that?s much more important than customer relations.  It really is the officers? responsibility to safeguard the citizens? constitutional rights in a very real way, day in and day out.

So if you look at that interaction, not so much as a customer situation but as an opportunity for the police to not only understand the Constitution, but to make sure that every component of the constitutional rights of people deserve in the United States is answered to and appropriately handled.  It puts new light on the officers? responsibility and on that interaction between the citizen and the police.  The way that officers talk to people, the way that they interact, what they do when they leave a traffic stop, what they do when they start a traffic stop, all of those things are important components of a system of government that we have.  The police are the most visible component of government that people see day in and day out, and I think it?s extremely important that officers understand that this is a critical part of what they do.  And every sentence that they put together, every comment that they make to the community reflects on government at large, and officers should understand that.

Katherine McQuay:
And how do you get at that?  How do you make them understand that?  Is it training?  Is it dialogue?

Chief Ed Davis:
Well, I think that training is obviously very important, but I think in that training we have to make it clear that this is more than a simple nice thing to do, or it?s more than, you know, the way that through policy and procedure we?re asking that officers act.  It?s about understanding that awesome responsibility that they have.  It?s about understanding that every encounter that they have can either make or break the reputation of the police department.  It can make or break the amount of trust that the person that they?re interacting with has with the community, has with the department that?s serving them.  And it can make a difference to an incident that occurs down the road.  It can establish a good relationship or not with someone who may be a witness to a homicide, with someone who may hold information that is crucial to the biggest case that the police department works on in a particular timeframe.  

So I think that if officers understand that our relationship with the community drives everything that we do -- a good homicide detective will tell you that we don?t solve homicides through CSI.  CSI is helpful; evidence is something that we have to be looking at.  But we solve homicides because people tell us who did it.  And if people don?t trust us, then they will not tell us who did it, no matter what the case is.  Terrorism cases, homicide cases, kidnapping cases, some of the dramatic things that you see over the course of the year, they all hinge upon our ability to establish a trusting relationship with the community and getting that community to reach out to us when they have information.  It makes all the difference in the world, not only with the reputation of the police department, but with the effectiveness and the reputation of the individual officer.  The more context they have, the more people that trust them, the better police officer they?re going to be.

Katherine McQuay:
And it seems like a side benefit is also having a more satisfied police officer who feels better about his job.

Chief Ed Davis:
There?s no question about it.  You know, after you?re on a police department for three to five years, especially in an active assignment, police officers tend to get cynical.  They tend to think that everybody?s lying to them or that everybody?s up to something.  And the more contact they have with an average citizen, the more contact they have that isn?t 911 driven in the midst of a crisis, they?re better for their own mental health.

Katherine McQuay:
Chief, thank you for the work you?re doing in Boston and thank you for being with us today.

Chief Ed Davis:
Thank you, Katherine.

Bernard Melekian Exit:
?The Beat? was brought to you by the United States Department of Justice COPS Office.  The COPS Office helps to keep our nation?s community safe by giving grants to law enforcement agencies, developing community policing publications, developing partnerships, and solving problems.

[end of transcript]

Adayana: Chief Ed Davis	2	7/12/10