By Laura DeKoven Waxman
June 29, 2009

Calling collaboration the theme of American policing, Providence Police Chief Dean Esserman organized and chaired a June 15 workshop that explored four different partnerships in which his department is engaged.

Building Our Way out of Crime: Representatives of the Local initiatives Support Corporation and the Olneyville Housing Corporation described an effort underway in Providence's Olneyville neighborhood in which the police department is working with community residents and stakeholders to develop a comprehensive revitalization effort. That effort uses principles of Crime Prevention through Environmental Design and has focused attention on specific high-crime areas — both small hotspots and larger revitalization areas — in Olneyville. Small hotspots occupied three percent of the area's geography, but took 16 percent of police resources; revitalization areas occupied eight percent of the geography and accounted for one-fourth of police resources. After the effort, hotspots accounted for three percent of police resources, revitalization areas seven percent — about what their fair share should be.

Children Exposed to Violence: Dr. Steven Marans of the Yale Child Study Center and Margaret Holland McDuff of Family Services of Rhode Island described an effort that began in New Haven and has now been replicated in Providence and other cities in which clinicians and police collaborate in efforts to work with children exposed to violence. Esserman helped to develop the program when he was Deputy Chief of Police in New Haven. The clinicians ride with police officers from 3:00-11:00 PM and are on call 24-7. They treat kids exposed to violence — particularly those who are most at risk and vulnerable — in an effort to make them feel safe, and they do so for as long as they need help.

National Network for Safe Communities: John Jay College President Jeremy Travis and John Jay Professor David Kennedy briefed the mayors on an effort underway in several cities to implement two strategies that have proven effective in reducing violence and eliminating drug markets. The effort is based on Boston's efforts to reduce gang/group violence and High Point's efforts to eliminate overt drug markets.

Cincinnati has already launched an effort to reduce violence based on Boston's "Operation Ceasefire" and Cincinnati Mayor Mark Mallory said that in its first 17 months the effort has reduced homicides by 40 percent. That effort targets the relatively small number of people — generally young men — who are responsible for a high percentage of the city's homicides. Street workers — often ex-offenders — are generally the first point of contact with many of these young men. They are provided education and various support services and given the option to change their behavior, and thereby improve their lives. If they do not do this, however, sanctions are clear and they will be "or be put away for a long time."

Immediately before the workshop, Travis and Kennedy joined with Providence Mayor David Cicilline, Cincinnati Mayor Mallory, and Hempstead (NY) Mayor Wayne Hall; police chiefs from Providence, Miami, and Boston; and Police Executive Research Forum Executive Director Chuck Wexler to announce the launch of the National Network of Safe Communities. They reported that 30 cities have joined the network and that a leadership group of six police chiefs — Boston's Ed Davis, Cincinnati's Tom Streicher, High Point's James Fealy, Los Angeles's William Bratton, Milwaukee's Ed Flynn, and Providence's Dean Esserman — will work with the larger Network to develop, demonstrate, and represent a national standard in addressing violent and drug crimes.

Teaching Police Department Initiative: Dr. Fred Schiffman of the Brown University Medical School briefed the mayors on an innovative effort underway to apply the principles of a teaching hospital to the city's police department. The effort began in local museums where the observation techniques of "cops and docs" were sharpened, their descriptive powers increased, and their problem'solving skills strengthened. Teny Gross of the Institute for the Study and Practice of Non-Violence described the work her organization does to bring police department and community representatives together to reduce violence in inner city neighborhoods. In particular, they train community residents to become non-violence trainers and street workers and work closely with the police department and hospitals to assist shooting victims.

Cicilline closed the session by describing the dramatic effect that community policing partnerships — now underway in every city neighborhood — have had on the crime rate in his city and the changes they have brought about within the Providence Police Department. He said that in the six years in which Chief Esserman has been at the helm the Department has been transformed from one that was under investigation by the Department of Justice to one that is now well respected and on its way to accreditation.