Category: 21st Century Policing

Central to this contemporary era of policing are calls for transparency and accountability. A common assumption is that transparency and accountability are inherently linked and that by simply increasing the amount of data available to the public, accountability and public trust will trend in a positive direction. As is often the case, the reality is that the issue is far more complex – more resembling a complex set of interconnected factors rather than a “point A to point B” linear system.

This article will explore where the notions of transparency and accountability in law enforcement come from, why they’re important, and a few of the resources available to agencies seeking to implement data disclosure systems.

Transparency and Democracy: An Ethical Framework

Accountability through transparency is fundamental to police reform efforts. This is all but a given now, but the idea that transparency is needed to ensure the legitimacy of law enforcement is a relatively recent development in understanding the role of government. A brief look at some basic political theory provides transparency’s philosophical and ethical underpinnings as a moral construct.

Early 20^th century sociologists and political scientists, particularly German sociologist Max Weber, argued that the authority of governmental officials, such as police officers, is legal and rational in that police derive the authority to enforce the law through law and regulations established by a democratic state or government. This stands in contrast to law enforcement that, for example in the Middle Ages, derived its authority from what philosophers would describe as charisma, like that of an autocrat or dictator, or by traditional means such as in the case of inherited royalty or title. Weber’s theories are now considered foundational in the way social scientists understand the sources of authority.

In a democracy, the government’s authority comes from the citizenry’s consent, it follows that the citizens influencing policy decisions through their elected representatives are interested in being well-informed so that they make wise decisions about their governance. The transparency that invited scrutiny then is essential to maintaining law enforcement’s legitimacy among the public in a democracy.

 Promoting Community Trust

“People are more likely to obey the law when they believe that those enforcing it have the legitimate authority to tell them what to do … The public confers legitimacy only on those they believe are acting in procedurally just ways” – President’s Task Force on 21^st Century Policing, 2015

The Final Report of the President’s Task Force on 21^st Century Policing identifies building trust and legitimacy as its first pillar in a six-point plan to transform policing for the 21st century. The report calls for several concrete steps designed to improve the public trust in policing by regularly making public data regarding stops, summonses, and arrests and collecting survey data from community members and officers to assess the effects of policy changes and initiatives holistically.

The greater availability of data creates more knowable information for the members of the public. The general population, especially those with programming and analytical skills, are able to digest and react to more data than ever before. While this certainly increases transparency in policing, studies published by the Department of Justice and RAND Corporation point out that, to increase public confidence, there has to be a broad perception that this transparency leads to accountability – whether that’s the termination of officers engaged in misconduct or broader policy changes. Simply disclosing data without the “follow up” of meaningful accountability can unintentionally draw attention to wrongdoing and give the impression it is more widespread than it is.

Setting the Agenda, Delivering the Funding

Data made available through transparency efforts have the potential to be a key element in growing community trust in police. That same data is also critical to informing future research, which, in turn, will be used to build policies that can contribute to a more positive public perception of law enforcement. There are two basic components to the research and funding cycle:

Creating research priorities: Research proposals center around research questions – essentially what a study or review hopes to answer. When an academic or research team seeks funding for a study, that research question is supported by data from previous research as new findings typically pose further questions. Though this may appear to be a cycle, it is more accurate to view it as the evolution of the knowledge surrounding a subject. With greater access to law enforcement data, whether by mandate or voluntary reporting, researchers can ask better questions and have greater confidence in their findings.

Setting funding priorities: Policymakers, charged with strategically administering grants and appropriations, typically set a high bar when deploying public funds. They look for evidence derived from research that their funds will be impactful. Sufficiently representative data, both in quantity and quality, guide this decision-making process which can mean additional funding for law enforcement programs and operations.

Building Systems for Transparency

As data reporting technology changes and regulatory mandates require additional types of data transparency, think tanks and professional organizations have been at the forefront of creating best practices recommendations for agencies. The Police Foundation created a five-part guide to help agencies draft policies for making their data public. These recommendations center around generating awareness using tools like social media, outreach to community groups, and creating easy-to-use, public-facing portals. Case studies in the guide take these ideas out of the world of theory and into the real world, illustrating practical examples of how agencies have successfully met data reporting requirements

The International Association of Chiefs of Police published a guide on reporting use of force that goes into even greater detail, specifying discrete data points agencies might consider including as a part of a broader data transparency strategy. The model policies in the document suggest what types of reports should be included, the data parameters of use of force reports, and procedural workflows that simplify the reporting process for agencies.

Benchmark Analytics routinely partners with agencies tasked with expanding their data reporting capabilities. Using the Benchmark Management System®, agencies can streamline the task of reporting myriad and complex data to public police data portals. By doing so, agencies can play an important role in increasing public trust, which, in turn, can help increase resources available to law enforcement, ultimately increasing police effectiveness.

In our previous article, we explored the underrepresentation of women in policing and why it is important for law enforcement leaders to address this shortfall. The article looked at what groups like the 30×30 Initiative are doing to increase the number of women as sworn officers. Today’s article takes a closer look at the group’s methodology and efforts to improve the representation of women in the profession.

An often-cited statistic shows that, while women make up more than half of the population, they represent fewer than 12% of sworn officers in the United States. When examining the number of women in law enforcement leadership roles, that figure shrinks to a paltry 3% — a number that is almost universally seen as a significant problem. While research dating back to the 1970s has documented the issue and made a strong argument for increasing the representation of women in law enforcement, these figures have remained effectively stagnant in most departments in the decades since.

There is an increased urgency among law enforcement leaders that recruiting and retaining women officers matters, with efforts to do so showing demonstrably positive outcomes for both law enforcement agencies and the communities they serve. Guided in part by these facts, Chief Ivonne Roman (ret.) of the Newark Police Department and Maureen McGough of the National Institute of Justice (NIJ) led a national research summit on women in policing in 2018 with more than 100 women representing researchers, law enforcement leadership, and professional organizations in attendance. The work from the meeting would be instrumental in propelling research and strategy on women in policing through the present day.

The 30×30 Initiative is one such effort guided by that summit. The group’s name is directly tied to its mission: to increase the representation of women in policing from 12% to 30% by 2030. Partnered with the Policing Project at the NYU School of Law and the National Association of Women Law Enforcement Executives, the 30×30 Initiative seeks to understand the issue by gathering vital data into the conditions affecting the number of women in law enforcement and using that data to make actionable, real-world recommendations for policy shifts and strategic plans to help improve these numbers. The organization uses a pledge already signed by hundreds of agencies large and small across the country to gather data and secure a long-term commitment to improving the number of women in law enforcement.

The 30×30 Pledge

Understanding that agencies have differing capacities, resources, and needs, the 30×30 Pledge that agencies and their leaders commit to is more akin to a “flexible framework” than a rigid list of actions and policies that require agencies’ strict compliance. Ideally, this flexibility is built into the pledge to give agencies the latitude to base their strategic decisions on evidence and analysis unique to their departments. The pledge itself is made of two primary phases that encompass both assessment actions and decision-making based on that analysis of the accrued data.

Crucially these are low- to no-cost actions that can be taken to improve the representation of women across ranks in law enforcement and improve their experience while on the job. The pledge first asks that departments commit to understanding gender equity, by unpacking the factors driving disparities, and developing plans to implement strategies to advance women in policing.

The first phase of the pledge comprises essential data gathering and implementing policies related to the hiring and retention of women in the department. The data gathering is relatively straightforward: collecting the number of sworn officers in an agency as well as demographic information across rank and assignment categories. It also requires that departments formally make hiring, retaining, and promoting women a strategic priority and affirm a zero-tolerance policy for discriminatory practices or harassment in the workplace. Going a step further, departments are asked to commit to providing adequate scheduling accommodation and physical space for nursing mothers. The last component of this first phase of the pledge addresses the equipment and gear issued by departments – specifically, that equipment is appropriate to the fit and proportions of women.

Translating Data into Action

The second reporting phase takes a deeper dive into diagnostic data and demographics, asking agencies to more rigorously classify and report their demographic data – including gender, race/ethnicity, and age – where possible. This phase of the pledge splits the data into four “lanes,” looking into hiring, promotion, retention and culture, and recruitment.

Generally speaking, the data gathering and reporting exercises focus on creating greater clarity on which sworn officers are applying for promotions, seeking voluntary training, leaving the agency, and generating data to assess the efficacy of recruitment programs. Looking at this in a larger context, this demographic and department-level information intersects with many of the research priorities outlined in the NIJ’s 2017-2022 Strategic Research Plan for policing.

In the long term, this data will help inform theory and research questions about policing but, in the near term, it is beneficial in providing the basis for best-practice recommendations. Taking things a step beyond data collections and analysis, a critical component of the 30×30 Pledge is translating these data-driven insights into an action plan. The same four lanes (hiring, promotion, retention and culture, and recruitment) categorize the actions areas.

The framework consists of essential, strongly recommended, and recommended areas of action. Essential action areas more often involve using aggregated data to recognize where biases exist and taking the necessary steps to address those biases with measures like ensuring voluntary training and promotion notifications are posted internally and that officers are up to date with bias and harassment training. Generally, steps both of the “recommended” categories seek to unpack the issues further, delving into structural issues that create barriers to women in policing.

Moving Forward with Intersectionality

While the 30×30 Initiative focuses on issues affecting women in law enforcement, the group makes a distinct nod towards intersectionality when describing their background and mission. Intersectionality is an analytical framework originating from the field of sociology that “acknowledges the ways in which people’s multiple identities—race and ethnicity, class, gender, sexual orientation, religion, ability, and more—magnify or transform their exposure to discrimination.” People at different intersections of these elements of identity have their experiences shaped in different ways.

In a practical sense, this means that the data and insights generated by the 30×30 Initiative can serve as a blueprint for other such efforts. The organization’s work is not siloed and geared only towards improving conditions for women but, in effect, can be used to benefit all officers who have struggled to find representation in policing. Using intersectionality as a bedrock of the 30×30 Initiative’s methodology means that the group’s work will be transferrable to other areas of research into law enforcement equity and efforts to create real-world strategies to help improve representation in law enforcement.

As we’ve covered in previous posts, recruitment shortfalls are creating serious headaches for law enforcement leaders. A wave of resignations heightened by a pandemic and challenges with public perceptions combined with a generational trend in retirements is creating a situation for departmental leaders where attrition surpasses recruitment capacity.

Women are substantially underrepresented in law enforcement. While making up more than half of the population, women represent fewer than 13% police officers. Though the number of women in law enforcement agencies has grown since the 1960s, their participation rate has been stagnant at this level for decades. Nearly every agency throughout the country has faced challenges in attracting women to the profession.

Why attract diverse candidates?

The reasons for making a conscious effort to bring more women into the profession are more than just ethical arguments. For as long as women have been working in the law enforcement field, social scientists and academics have taken a keen interest in designing research to help us better understand what they bring to the job and how they compare to their male counterparts. Studies have confirmed intuitions about unique skills women bring to their agencies and communities as well as cast serious doubts on outdated assumptions surrounding their capabilities and job performance.

Social scientists and researchers have been studying the impacts of a gender-diverse police force since the 1970s. A landmark study in 1987 as well as many subsequent studies have contributed to the strong argument that diverse police forces are beneficial to the communities they serve.

Research suggests female officers are less likely to be involved in incidents involving excessive use of force than their male counterparts. Though a correlation has not been conclusively established, women also tend to show, on average, more advanced interpersonal communication skills, which suggests they may be more likely to practice de-escalation tactics, further reducing the incidence of excessive force.

Women officers are highly skilled at addressing crimes involving violence against women and sex crimes. Sexual assault is a sensitive issue, and it is thought that more significant numbers of female officers may help break down some of the barriers to reporting such crimes. Studies have shown a correlation between increased female representation on police forces and declines in intimate partner murder rates and rates of repeated domestic abuse, as well as higher clearance rates in these cases.

In an era when public trust in the police has eroded to critical levels, law enforcement leaders have an urgent interest in finding ways to rebuild that trust. Writing for the International Association of Chiefs of Police (IACP) Police Chief Magazine, Retired Chief of Newark Police Ivonne Roman documented a link between trust in the police to the proportion of women serving in an agency. More advanced interpersonal skills related to conflict resolution, de-escalation, and use of force likely contribute to these observations.

Barriers to Recruiting Women

There is a consensus among policing leaders that women bring valuable skills and experience to the profession and that these abilities enhance an agency’s capacity to fulfill its mission. As referenced earlier in this post, recruitment numbers have, for generations, fallen short of representation targets needed to field a more diverse police force. Like many issues facing police recruiters, there is no simple one-step solution to these problems but rather an interconnected set of strategies policing leaders employ.

Revised physical aptitude standards for entrance into police academies are among the more impactful tactics to increase recruitment.  These standards vary widely from agency to agency, with some considering aspects like differences in upper body muscle mass when creating standards. Other agencies have uniform standards, regardless of gender. Comprehensive data is not readily available, but anecdotal reports suggest these physical fitness requirements have a disparate impact on female applicants.

Within some pockets of policing, there can be lingering doubts and anxiety about female colleagues’ abilities to do the job as well as their male colleagues. These outdated views are often expressed in the form of harassment on the job. Laws dealing with sexual harassment have been strengthened in the last twenty years, which, combined with broader cultural shifts, show promise at improving working conditions.

While women make up only 13% of police officers, their numbers are even smaller in leadership roles. Recent data compiled by the National Institute of Justice (NIJ) shows that 9.5% of first-line supervisors are women and only represent 2.7% of executive leadership. It is widely understood that mentorship programs involving senior officers and leaders providing coaching support to junior officers are tied to a wide range of improved outcomes in rank advancement and retention, job performance, and officer and family wellness.

Next Steps

The NIJ’s Women in Policing: Breaking Barriers and Blazing a Path crucially lays out a research agenda designed to create more empirical evidence for crafting policies to improve the recruitment of women officers. Several research questions are categorized under six themes that, broadly, seek to more clearly identify the scope of the problem, look at cultural and performance-based barriers to recruitment, and understand better how retention and advancement figure into the overall picture. The report also outlines questions raised by officers in the field as another means to inform future research.

The 30X30 Initiative is a prominent example of an advocacy coalition bringing together current and former law enforcement leaders with research institutions with the goal of “increase[ing] the representation of women in police recruit classes to 30% by 2030, and to ensure[ing] police policies and culture intentionally support the success of qualified women officers throughout their careers”. This group frames the issue as a matter of both equity and public safety, using evidence to show that agencies with greater representation of women historically show better outcomes for both their communities and their officers.

The 30X30 Initiative…frames efforts to recruit women as a matter of both equity and public safety…

Like all complex social problems, additional research is still needed to understand issues of gender parity in recruiting. There is, however, broad agreement among law enforcement leaders that it needs to be a priority moving forward. In an era of substantial recruiting and public perception challenges, the evidence showing that women make extremely valuable contributions to the communities and agencies they serve can no longer be overlooked.

Moving into 2022, a lot is changing in the world of law enforcement — legislation is reshaping policies and tactics while enhanced data collection and reporting is giving new insight into officer performance metrics and crime statistics. Police recruitment remains an issue facing law enforcement leaders in 2022, changing only because the need is growing as trends in retirement and resignation continue. This article looks at how cultural and employment trends affect staffing levels and recruitment levels in law enforcement with an eye towards the future.

What’s Causing Recruitment and Staffing Shortfalls?

For decades, social sciences researchers have been studying police recruitment efforts and documenting the pivot in the profession to a more highly skilled and technically proficient workforce needed for the 21^st century. Despite a whole field of research devoted to law enforcement recruitment and retention, the problem persists to such an extent that even mainstream national news outlets are taking note. Both CNN and the Wall Street Journal have covered the topic in recent weeks, highlighting interviews with law enforcement leaders about their experience with staffing shortfalls and speaking to officers about why they left the profession.

It is too soon for comprehensive reporting from 2021 to be available, but the most recent research from the Police Executive Research Forum (PERF) speaks to the magnitude of recruitment shortfalls. From April of 2020 to March of 2021, resignations rose at 18%, while retirements jumped an impressive 45%. Adding to the urgency created by staffing shortages, these statistics show how large agencies (500+ sworn officers) are likely feeling the effects more intensely than smaller departments. The report showed that “large” agencies faced a 36% reduction in recruitment numbers over the same period.

Understanding the magnitude of the problem is generally easier than understanding the underlying factors contributing to it. The COVID-19 global pandemic has upended and realigned industries throughout the country, including law enforcement. Making its way into headlines as of late is the notion of a Great Resignation which has seen workers reprioritizing work-life balance and seeking higher wages in a job seeker’s market, the likes of which have not been experienced in at least a generation. Though there’s evidence this wave of resignations may have hit its peak in 2021, the ripple effects are likely to affect staffing levels well into 2022.

The issues driving this wave of resignations – working hours, conditions, and pay – are particularly prevalent in law enforcement. Shiftwork is especially difficult for law enforcement officers where inconsistent scheduling and unpredictable overtime can create acute problems for an officer’s health and wellness. The national average annual pay for law enforcement officers remains above the salary of the average American worker. This is not always true in some parts of the country, especially those with booming technology sectors. The draw of higher-paying and less-dangerous work puts law enforcement at an inherent disadvantage regarding recruitment.

Lastly, public perception of police and policing strategies creates barriers to more robust recruiting across the profession. The Pew Research Center conducts longitudinal research on public perception of law enforcement and has charted notable declines in survey participants’ views on how police treat the public and how effectively investigators pursue misconduct cases. The results of these surveys tend to be most visible along with race and political lines though there’s been some softening of positive views across the board. These broader cultural attitudes create an issue for recruiters where a sociological concept known as social desirability bias — the desire to present one’s attitudes, behaviors, and occupation in a positive light – steers potential recruits away from a profession with a perceived negative social stigma attached to it.

Effects of Staff Shortages

The numbers surrounding staffing shortfalls in law enforcement are easy to understand. However, the effects of the issue are more profound than can be conveyed in spreadsheets of survey results. Staffing shortfalls create real hardships not only for departments struggling to recruit new officers but for the officers themselves who struggle with long hours and difficult working conditions.

Low recruiting numbers create financial challenges for departments that turn to signing bonuses to attract potential recruits. In Washington State, law enforcement leaders offer bonuses of as much as $25,000 to help lure recruits. Other counties in the state, like King County (Seattle), seek outside help from recruiting specialists to boost their numbers. These signing bonuses and recruitment consultants come at a cost when growth in spending on policing is under increased and intense public scrutiny in many areas of the country. Additionally, though municipal and state legislative bodies provide funding for bonuses and contractors, there is no guarantee these funding packages will become permanent parts of the law enforcement budget, with many being framed as one-time expenditures.

When officers resign or retire, their shifts don’t leave the department with them. Though the public perception of crime rates doesn’t always match reality, the facts are that property crimes like carjacking are on the rise. Murder rates are jumping year-over-year while clearance rates are dropping. These trends create a greater need for officers on patrol, but the shortfall requires extra shifts and potentially unwanted overtime. These factors contribute to a cyclical effect of long hours and stressful work driving increased burnout, leading officers to pursue careers in other fields.

A Complex Problem

For generations, law enforcement agencies have experienced shortfalls in their recruitment efforts. The profession, to many, is seen as a higher calling to public service that requires rigorous ethical and performance characteristics of its recruits – qualities not found in just anyone. In recent years, recruitment shortfalls have been compounded by broad, societal trends set into motion by high-profile policing incidents and a global pandemic. While agencies can turn to incentives and outside consultants in the short term, investments in systemic change to the profession are most likely to create lasting change. Leadership development and technical training are shown to move the needle somewhat. Still, most experts agree that the hard work reforming the public perception of policing and the nature of the profession will go a long way to improving recruitment shortfalls.

Calls for reform brought about by high-profile incidents have led to an unprecedented pace of legislation affecting law enforcement over the past two years. New laws and the change they’ve created have reshaped policing since 2020 and will undoubtedly continue to influence law enforcement trends in 2022. This article looks at some of the prominent themes we’re monitoring as the new year gets underway.

Change Management as a Constant

A prominent theme in law enforcement policy has been a rapid and profound legislative change in recent years. The pace of reform legislation has been swift, with 453 bills addressing law enforcement passed into law over the last two years. What this means for law enforcement leaders is an urgent need to create strategies to implement sweeping changes to their agencies’ policies and data-gathering practices.

Law enforcement agencies are often seen as organizations where changes come slowly, emphasizing tradition and continuity. This is, in part, due to the nature of the profession. When dealing with the safety of officers and the public they serve, leaders can be reluctant to make broad changes that could be perceived to threaten that stability. Legislative mandates, however, are compelling law enforcement leaders, in most cases, to enact policy changes on defined timelines.

Policing executives are increasingly looking towards the corporate world for guidance on change management strategies. Strategies like McKinsey’s 7-S Framework and Kotter’s Method are often used in the business world to introduce potentially problematic changes to an organization, and most importantly, create the buy-in needed to move towards change as a whole organization.  While there is some variation in the methods to build the momentum for change, they both fundamentally rely on a bottom-up approach that increases buy-in and ultimately successful transition in policies.

Officer Wellness in 2022

The conditions that have been a primary driver of reform legislation have prompted policymakers, citizens, and law enforcement to step back and look at the bigger picture of policing. Individual actions, events, and policies are increasingly viewed in their context as part of larger systems. While much media attention is on aspects of reform measures aimed to add transparency to policing operations, many of those pieces of legislation also have substantial components that address the health and wellness of law enforcement officers.

At the federal level, the Department of Justice, in conjunction with Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS), announced $7 million in grants late last year as a part of the Law Enforcement Mental Health and Wellness Act Program. A total of 65 grants were disbursed in the previous year to state, tribal, and local law enforcement agencies throughout the United States and Puerto Rico. These grants are a valuable first step in establishing and maintaining programs like peer support, suicide prevention, and family services to support officer wellness in 2022 and beyond.

Looking to the state level, many of the mandates and programs concerning mental health and wellness coming into effect in 2022 are a more direct result of recent policing reform legislation than federal programs. The state-level initiatives cover a broad range of topics pertaining to mental health and, in many cases, expand upon federally funded programs. A few notable examples include:

• New Hampshire created a new commission with SB142 to study post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) in first responders. The commission’s findings will be delivered on or before November 1, 2022 and will be used to make further recommendations for programmatic funding.
• S24 in Texas authorized the Texas Commission on Law Enforcement to roll out a peer-support network for law enforcement officers in January of 2022. Peer support networks and associated programs are being formalized throughout the country and are considered to be among the most effective means to promote officer wellness.
• The Utah state legislature enacted H248, which opened up a half-million dollars in state-funded grants to be awarded before June 30, 2022. These grants will provide funding for mental health resources for law enforcement officers and other first responders.
• S703 was introduced and moved to committee in New Jersey in January of 2022. The New Jersey First Responders Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder Protection Act addresses PTSD among law enforcement officers and first responders by guarding against retaliation or loss of benefits. Another bill introduced in New Jersey in 2022, A1622, seeks to create funding for a PTSD hotline administered jointly by the New Jersey Department of Health and behavioral healthcare specialists from Rutgers University.

Data Analysis and Management

Law enforcement researchers have long used policing data to understand everything from community/police interactions to health outcomes in the policing community. The insights that can be gained from this data can create positive change both for the law enforcement profession and their communities. Unfortunately, many agencies haven’t had the funding or workers to bring their recordkeeping and data management practices into the 21^st century.

Much of the recent reform legislation frames data collection mandates as a move towards greater transparency. However, another beneficial effect of these measures is increasing the data researchers use to study law enforcement as well as creating new data sources for agencies to use to make smarter decisions around personnel and allocation of resources.

In North Carolina, SB300 mandated the creation of data capture systems used to inform early intervention systems and a critical incident database tracking use of force. The mandate took effect in December of 2021, and agencies in the state have either begun improving or establishing such systems. Maryland’s SB670 requires that certain officer misconduct records be available for public inspection. In practice, this means agencies must have the capacity to report incident data to publicly accessible portals or databases, requiring the agencies to have procedures to standardize and report this data.

A Busy Year Ahead

The pace of reform legislation and the changes it will create in law enforcement show no sign of slowing down. 2022 promises to be another active year in state legislatures. As new mandates pass, law enforcement leaders will be seeking new solutions to guide their agencies through this period of change for the profession.

Benchmark Analytics’ First Sign® is a first-of-its-kind, research-driven early intervention platform that is custom-tailored to agencies of any size. The Benchmark Management System® captures use-of-force, internal affairs, and other data to help agencies meet the requirements of reporting mandates while providing law enforcement leaders with an analytics-driven and holistic view of their agency.