Kent Citizens' Police Academy Introductory Session

“If the level of organization presented by the Kent Police Department to the first Citizen Police Academy class continues, then we are in good hands. This is the impression I took away from the first session which introduced the upper command structure, the aging physical plant and the dispatch section which receives 911 and non-emergency calls.”

That’s how I started this blog post. The very term itself – blog – when first heard made me think of something I do in winter to clear my sinuses … so stand back if you don’t want to get any on 'ya.

Hmm. ... Kent Police Academy? Kent Citizen Police Academy?!
In early-1970s politically correct terms it would have been phrased the “Kent Peoples’ Police Academy.”

You follow me? Can you dig it? I’m not worried. After all, you’ve been warned: this is a blog.

I go back to the capable Chief Roy Thompson, who was a neighborhood guy residing on Crain Avenue across from DePeyster field. I ruled around the corner, on North Willow Street. In "them" days, Chief Roy probably dealt with plenty of errant baseballs landing in his yard (or living room) from the constant summer little league play directly across the street. He had no idea his job would eventually morph from wrangling baseball parent fisticuffs, traffic tickets, drunk factory workers, an occasional murder, panty riots at , and then to (drum roll) … May 4. Rim shot!

(Sorry, have to inject some musical terminology here ‘cause that’s what I
do.)

Couldn’t resist it: the very idea of a giant friendly police finger reaching out to tap me on the shoulder and invite me over for tea and cakes … I bet I was the first one to have the paperwork filed after reading about it in these evanescent electronic pages. Lt. Paul Canfield will probably set me straight on that claim at the next meeting.

Officer Canfield … our leader. I wonder if Chief Michelle Lee assigned him this task or if he volunteered? Nah, it was probably automatic by dint of his somewhat-military job description — “Administrative Lieutenant.” Lt. Canfield’s favorite job outside of his executive workload is being a sniper with the Metro Swat unit. Don’t let the permanent Cheshire cat smile and articulate good humor fool you into thinking Canfield is anything but a consummate, dedicated professional. He is far removed from a certain Kent cop of yore (some of you will know immediately of whom I write) who would just as soon smack you as take your complaint or file a report. Them, er, those days, are long gone at the KPD, I’m happy to report.

Now the police wrangle mostly computer keyboards and paper. “Information gathering is the foundation of police work,” as Canfield puts it, "... and it takes 90 to 95 percent of our time." Dispatch Coordinatior Rosemarie Mosher’s detailed presentation on the vast responsibilities of a dispatcher/records clerk could have been made before an academic degree committee at Kent State. I ought to know, my dad was a prof – and I’m a faculty brat – so there!

During Mosher’s dissertation they coyly began handing out layers of various types of reports which rapidly compile from a simple traffic stop or complaint. If charges are filed the paperwork redoubles or triples. Mistakes of information gathering are to be avoided because the result can be a blown case. And mistakes will be made, Canfield points out, because "the police are human."

The tools: CAD (Computer Automated Dispatch), MDT (Mobile Data Terminal), LEADS (Law Enforcement Automated Data System). Forget the CSI glitz and floating glass plasma display screens seen on TV. This is a hardcore in-the-trenches data-gathering effort which has to flow both directions via the dispatchers. Officers who appear to be doing nothing in their cars are usually filing reports on the MDT, which at least places them out in the community and not back at the station doing the same vital task. Those MDTs also keep them informed about warrants and criminal backgrounds when making a traffic stop. But we know this because we all watch COPS, right?

Citizens’ Alert: make note of serial numbers and designations of your valuable stuff. If you are victimized by theft the police data tools are really handy with such information. You may recover your losses if you can furnish the police with the model and serial numbers because the items will pop up as stolen when a captured thief’s booty is entered in the system somewhere else.

Support Services Capt. Jayme Cole took us on a tour of the old building (three additions and five remodels) which has a chaotic layout totally opposite to the smooth flow of information. In fact, misplaced load-bearing walls, collapsing ceilings and uneven construction have hobbled the data-processing infrastructure. Around every corner, hallways and meager closets have been turning into narrow open offices or equipment rooms. Before this I was of the mindset which said, “Aah, put ’em in trailers if they need more space.” If there was a case to be made for a new building, then Cole’s hospitality tour made it in slam-dunk style.

In my time in Kent, from Chief Roy Thompson to Chief Michelle Lee, the police work has leaped a century or more in training and technology. I’ve wondered about the development of SWAT teams. Are they a product of the urban riots in the 1960s and the subsequent drug wars? In our case the change was propelled by May 4th and the national attention focused here. I recall that Kent was the first application of caller ID (a computer punch card system) in response to the bomb threats called into Kent State. Friends told me of being summoned for FBI interviews at a high-tech nerve center on campus which was coordinating a surveillance and suppression effort. Never saw it myself.

At the same time, Kent was a wide-open town with throngs of people on the streets on the weekends hearing live music at several venues. Dig this: Figures compiled by the Kent Tavern Owners Association from 1965 to 1970 indicate an attendance of at least 3,120,000 customers across eight to 10 bars, many featuring live music.

The fall after May 4 it seemed everyone came back to school with long hair and, for the males, a beard or attempted beard. I was part of such a crowd on North Water Street in front of the Kove and Walter’s Café when a guy with long hair, beard and fringed deerskin jacket stood on the threshold of Walter’s with an outstretched arm and yelled, “I’ve got 300 hits of mescaline for sale … 300 hits!”

(Insert the old “Dragnet” theme song here: Dum ta-dum dum.)

A few months earlier, just back from Vietnam, I was downtown at the same spot on May 1, 1970, and observed furious young people throwing firecrackers and smashing beer bottles on police cars slowly driving by. The degrees of crowd opinion about this activity formed in concentric rings around it. Later we became aware of the MATS (Mahoning, Ashtabula, Trumbull, Summit counties) squad which was formed for an anti-drug effort and made at least one mistaken local home invasion. This seems to be an early iteration of what has become formalized as SWAT.  

And yet, Kent was a wild place and continued to be so for the rest of the 1970s, but the bloom was gone from the rose. The good vibes of the 1960s steadily gave way to the post-May 4 era of declining fortunes and negativity. In that decade alone Kent lost 2,000 industrial jobs. The crowds in town for live music began to dwindle as the street scene became tougher and the cops got mean. The police must deal with it no matter which way the social conditions move. I can only imagine how much more dangerous and difficult it became to be a police officer in Kent, compared to before, with pressure coming from national, state and county officials concerned about student unrest and drug activity.

To this day whenever a police car shows up in my rear view mirror my throat gets tight and my heart palpitates. What is that all about? Do I have a persecution complex or do many of us feel that way? When I pointed this out at the first academy session Lt. Canfield humorously shot back, “Same thing happens to me, Roger.” I suspect, however, that his heart may beat in one direction while mine beats another, if that is even possible. Earlier Capt. Greg Urchek, operations officer, mentioned the goal of the academy was to get the officers from behind the anonymity of that 3,000-pound steel police car. From what I have learned so far, mission accomplished. The cops are a lot more fun in person.  

Next week’s academy session includes traffic control (parking tickets, whoopee!), animal control and criminal law.