University Police

As defined by the Office of Community Policing, community policing focuses on crime and social disorder through the delivery of police services that includes aspects of traditional law enforcement, as well as prevention, problem-solving, community engagement and partnerships.  The community policing model balances reactive response to calls for service with proactive problem-solving centered on the causes of crime and disorder.  Community policing requires police and citizens to join together as partners in the course of identifying and effectively addressing these issues.

Under community policing, law enforcement focuses not only on enforcement but also on crime prevention and proactively addressing the root causes of crime and disorder.  The community actively engages in collaboration on prevention and problem-solving activities with the goal of reducing victimization and fear of crime.

Police and community members work together to address underlying problems that contribute to crime and disorder by identifying and analyzing problems, developing suitable responses, and addressing the effectiveness of these responses.  The department relies heavily more on preventing crime through deterring offenders, protecting likely victims and making crime locations less conducive to problems.

In community policing, citizens are viewed by the police as partners who share responsibility for identifying priorities, and developing and implementing responses.  Accurate surveying of customer needs and priorities is required under community policing to determine the problems that drive police services and give public ownership of the problem-solving process.