The Police Foundation provides a wide range of training, technical assistance, and technology specializations and services to law enforcement agencies and to state and local governments, including:

• Developing training programs to meet specific organizational requirements and objectives

• Conducting management and operational reviews of entire or selected agency policies, procedures, and performance;

• Managing strategic planning and organizational development;

• Assessing organizational culture and ethics;

• Managing human resources;

• Assisting with police chief selection;

• Assessing and improving police-community relations;

• Early-warming and intervention systems

Training

The Police Foundation develops and implements customized training and technical assistance programs designed to enhance skills, improve the quality of police service, and increase community confidence. Training and technical assistance topics have included:

• Crime mapping, crime analysis, and problem analysis

• Early warning and intervention systems

• Ethics and accountability

• Grant writing and grant management

• Human resources management

• Integrity for leadership

• Management strategies

• Policing diverse communities

• Professional and leadership development

• Strategic planning and organizational development

• Strategies for community policing 

Human Resources

The foundation offers a wide range of human resource services, including:

• promotional testing

• structured panel interview assistance

• adverse impact analysis

• tracking of officer performance  

• performance appraisal systems

Police Chief Selection

Throughout its history, the Police Foundation has been asked by dozens of state and local governments to assist them in examining, defining, and managing the process by which a new chief of police is selected.

Selecting a police chief is for many municipal executives one of the most crucial official decisions they will make. The police department carries out one of the most basic functions of local government, and its employees are among the most publicly visible. The leader of the police department, therefore, does much to affect how citizens view the entire municipal government.

Yet municipal officials responsible for appointing a police chief are too often at a loss to know how to go about this task. Unless they have done it before and have learned from their mistakes, they will not be aware of many of the pitfalls that can confront them.

Several factors–the high visibility of the police department within the community, the increasing complexity of modern policing, and the potential for heated debate on whether a new police chief should be selected from within or from outside a department–can combine in a troublesome way for the municipal executive.

Of course, there is a beneficial aspect to selecting a new police chief. A vacancy can provide an opportunity for the municipal executive to bring to the community the kind of policing which is consistent with his or her philosophy. A vacancy thus provides both a challenge and an opportunity.

Published in 1976, Police Chief Selection: A Handbook for Local Government, remains a unique and important reference for local governments on the problems and possibilities of selecting a police chief. To obtain a copy, please go to Publications List.

Police-Community Relations

For the police to be effective, they must have the trust and cooperation of the citizens they serve. Often the communities most in need of effective policing because of high crime rates are the very communities most distrustful of the police. Progressive police executives have come to understand that, in order to generate community support, the police must think and act like they are a part of the community they serve. Police must engage the community as partners and be responsive to community concerns.

The Police Foundation has developed an innovative method for assessing police-community interactions and generating recommendations designed to bring about positive changes in this area. The assessment process examines: (1) recruitment, selection, retention, and promotion of personnel; (2) training systems supporting high-risk tasks such as use of force, pursuits, arrest procedures, etc.; (3) police-community relations systems; (4) internal discipline and control processes such as internal affairs systems, internal investigative systems, etc.; (5) use of force policies and control systems; and (6) techniques used to manage police culture.

Working with municipal officials, the police agency, and the community, the foundation generates recommendations designed to create positive change.

Early-Warning and Intervention Systems

Its comprehensive research on police use of force led the foundation to launch a multi-year research and development effort to create technologies to help police agencies monitor officers whose behavior places departments at risk, erodes public confidence, increases liability, and undermines effectiveness. More than an early-warning system, The RAMS™(Risk Analysis Management System) offers a comprehensive approach to ensuring proper training, accountability, quality service, and community satisfaction with police services.

Though the existence of racial profiling is common knowledge, attempts to prove its existence have mainly relied on anecdotal accounts and piecemeal, though suggestive, evidence. Collecting data on traffic and pedestrian stops, analyzing this information, and putting the results under public scrutiny can help shift the debate on racial profiling from perusal of anecdotal reports to analysis of valid statistical data and assist in the development of strategies to address the actual practice of racial profiling. To this end, the foundation has developed the QSI™(Quality of Service Indicator) a state-of-the-art system that allows departments to collect and analyze traffic stop data, gauge the quality of service their officers provide, make improvements in this area, and thereby maximize community trust.  

For more information about these services, please contact Earl Hamilton at ehamilton@policefoundation.org or Karen Amendola at kamendola@policefoundation.org.