For better or for worse, it’s safe to say law enforcement matters haven’t received this much mainstream media coverage in quite some time. Ferguson, body cameras, “militarization” and community policing practices are suddenly hot topics chatted about—frequently—on public radio, news stations (and entertainment news stations), local newspapers and social media.
I find it interesting because police agencies are generally concerned with these matters just about all the time, only now, thanks to a perfect storm of events and the stickiness of certain news topics, John Doe down the street shares the intrigue and concern (or at the least, passively hears and is therefore aware) of these things agencies wrestle with every day.
Now is the time we’ll be seeing some interesting changes to the profession. Carole Moore offers her two cents on the topic of police militarization in this months’ On Your Watch column (pg. 42). Section 1033 and the acquisition of military equipment by law enforcement agencies is upsetting to some for different reasons—it could be the perception of how the equipment is being used, or maybe concerns about each item’s necessity. On the other side of it you’ll hear from those agencies who have maybe purchased an armored vehicle for its SWAT team and they’ll tell you and just how beneficial it was in reaching survivors of a mass casualty incident, or chugging through impossible terrain.
Body camera discourse isn’t likely to disappear anytime soon, either. A few weeks ago I had the privilege to attend the One2One Public Safety Summit in Jacksonville, Florida. At one point a panel of top brass from places like Oregon, Texas, North Carolina and Chicago led a panel discussion talking about how each is already implementing (or starting to implement) body cameras into daily life.
Irving (Texas) PD’s Assistant Chief of Police Jeff Spivey mentioned there have been so many tech changes in the last couple years, they were still researching options when the mandate came down. “We didn’t want to get in too soon…Ferguson sped things up,” he says.
This month, as well as stories to help you prep for your body cam purchase (pg. 14 and pg. 34) we also bring you a generous collection of knives to peruse (pg. 8) and some of the top technology highlights from the International Association of Chiefs of Police conference in October, also known as IACP.
We hope you enjoy the issue. With more ‘average folks’ tuned into today’s hot law enforcement topics it could make for heated debate. But also probably some good conversations, too.
