337 MAGAZINE: New Police Chief's Community Policing Initiative Aims to Bridge Gaps

By Vicky Roe

It’s only been a few months since Thomas Glover became the Chief of Police for the Lafayette Police Department, but he already has big plans of change for the community. With trust hanging in the balance, Chief Glover knows he needs to build trust not only in himself as the new Police Chief, but also between the department and the general public. So, what will it take? More than words, it’s going to take action. Chief Glover’s new initiative is not aimed at building a temporary fix for high tensions, but a true change in Lafayette.

Chief Glover explained, “The Lafayette Police Department is going to be practicing community policing from the top down and I’ve mandated that every sworn officer in this department has to do at least one community service event per week. That can be anything from coaching a baseball team, talking to Girls Scouts, doing a security survey for an elderly citizen, all the way down to going to a convenient store, drinking a cup of coffee and chatting with the clerk about any particular problems they may be experiencing. The essence of it is to get officers in contact with the citizens without being dispatched on a 911 call. We are going to try to build trust and a stronger relationship with the community through this and it will work.”

Chief Glover hopes to increase those hours over the next year or two, possibly moving to two events a week. For now he is setting his initial sights on implementing this program to get officers in a position where they’re not just in a vehicle or responding to a 911 emergency call, but rather where they’re initiating the contact, not the citizen.

Lafayette Police Chief Thomas Glover

As far as how Chief Glover will hold officers accountable, he explained, “I will document it and conduct random requests for what they did. I may go two weeks and not ask for any documentation and then the third week, I would say, ‘Provide me with your documentation for the past two or three weeks on what you’ve done in the community.’ We’ve already started; in fact, a few weeks ago I did my first random act for three people. They all were prepared, and they all had it... and that’s why I’m making it random so that they won’t just think that I’ll ask for it every Thursday or every Monday and feel like they have a specific day to do it. I will randomly ask so they have to stay on their p’s and q’s.”

With a lot of tension currently, particularly when it comes to law enforcement and Black and Brown communities, some say community policing would be like putting a bandage on a wound the size of open-heart surgery.

Chief Glover says that community policing is not the bandage, it’s the cure. “It will inspire people to become involved with Police Departments. I’ve been in the business for almost 40 years, and I’ve worked in just about every facet of policing that you can, and I can tell you that one of the biggest complaints that the communities of color will have when they talk to you, is that they don’t see enough of the police department. It’s one of the top complaints that they have...is that they’d like to see more officers driving by waving at us, shaking hands, talking to us.”

In the long term, Chief Glover hopes to see community support for his goals. “We want community stakeholders to understand that we are here for them and they will join us in programs; crime-fighting programs. I want to bring out a Junior Police Academy where young people, ages 10, 11 and 12 want to become Police Officers. I’m going to be doing a Citizens Police Academy where adults will be trained on some of the things that Police Officers do, and all of these go hand in hand.”

With hopes of a brighter future, Chief Glover has a clear plan of how he will measure the success of the program. “The reward and measure of success is that the crime rate goes down, community involvement goes up and we can identify people by name and face who work with us and it has to continue to multiply.”

Vicky Roe

With Vicky Roe, you’re getting the best of both worlds - born and raised in New York City but growing up in Charlotte, North Carolina gives her the Concrete Jungle hustle with a solid serving of Southern Hospitality!

After numerous opportunities, including working for “American Idol” during their stint in Charlotte, to interning for the “Rachael Ray Show”, to becoming a Television News Reporter in Alabama, she ultimately made her way back to Charlotte where she worked as the Executive Producer for a Morning Radio Show. The experience both behind the scenes and on the mic, set her up to be the next powerhouse on Q95.5 in Lafayette, Louisiana, and now contributing writer for 337 Magazine.