In 2016, the Voorhees Police Department Citizen Police Academy was introduced in response to the enhanced scrutiny of police by the media and the public in response to high-profile officer-involved shootings and in-custody deaths in the US.   This presentation will discuss how the topics instructed to the class were identified, use of reality-based training in conjunction with education on policies, concerns officers expressed during the program's development, on-boarding personnel to participate, the application/selection process, and how to maintain relationships with participants after graduation.  The perceptions of police will be explored by reviewing data collected via self-reporting surveys both pre and post-program.

Since 2014 a magnitude of police critical incidents has been publicized in local and national media. Regardless of the impact of these events, police officers are still expected to be resilient, engage the community. As a result, officer activity has been called into question, seeking a desire to understand if police officers are not engaging due to secondary trauma. Secondary trauma is defined as the emotional duress that results when an individual hears about or sees the trauma experienced by another. This session will educate participants on the relationship of secondary secondary trauma and performance in police departments. Speakers will present findings of a police-led mixed methods study on secondary trauma in two police departments.

Law Enforcement agencies across the nation are under immense pressure to keep crime rates low despite dwindling budgets and reductions in staffing. At the same time, businesses need to keep operations afloat without the worry of being targeted by criminal activity and combating it on their own. While law enforcement agencies have the technology to quickly respond to incidents when they occur, businesses can do more in equipping law enforcement with valuable knowledge that would enable them to prevent crime before it even happens.   By extending knowledge beyond each of their respective silos, officers can more effectively allocate resources, reduce investigation cycles and build trust and transparency in the community. Simultaneously, business owners can focus on successfully running their businesses, rest assured that local law enforcement will be able to more quickly and intelligently respond to any potential incidents, mitigating risk and losses due to crime. Hear from agencies and industry practitioners on how they are building partnerships with their communities by leveraging video technology and community policing tactics. Your agency will gain best practices, considerations, and insights to implementing your own public-private video-sharing program. By sharing technology and resources, business owners and law enforcement can maximize public safety.

Acquiring community assent and support is often a critical component of violent crime initiatives, especially those that target specific individuals (e.g., prolific offenders) and areas (e.g., hot spot policing). Without engaging the community, these types of violent crime reduction efforts may strain relationships between a police department and the community they serve. In this panel, participants will discuss the ways local police departments are engaging their communities in the fight against violent crime; and the impact of those efforts. Additionally, the BJS developed Local- Area Crime Victimization Survey, which measures crime and attitudes about police and public safety will be discussed.