NCJ Number
198855
Journal
Sheriff Volume: 55 Issue: 1 Dated: January-February 2003 Pages: 16-19
Date Published
January 2003
Length
4 pages
Annotation
This article describes the grant program of the U.S. Justice Department's Office of Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS), entitled "Creating a Culture of Integrity," in which 25 sheriffs' offices and 35 police departments throughout the country have already received funding for efforts to bolster the integrity of their agencies; the efforts of some of these agencies are summarized.
Abstract
It is expected that law enforcement agencies that receive funding through the COPS Integrity grant initiative will develop strategies and best practices that can then be replicated by other agencies. The agencies that applied for funding chose from a menu of allowed activities. Sheriffs' offices' applicants gave priority to command staff integrity training, recruiting qualified individuals from local communities, ensuring accountability to the public, and self-assessment techniques for internal monitoring of ethics and integrity issues. Police chiefs have placed more emphasis on use-of-force issues and the handling of citizen complaints. In Riverside County, CA, the COPS funding will help the sheriff's office reach out to and recruit more members of minority groups who live in the county. The Salt Lake County Sheriff's Office (Utah) will use its grant to provide equipment, temporary staff, and resources to launch a comprehensive new approach to managing integrity-related issues; and the Minnesota Sheriffs' Association will use its funding to conduct training sessions on integrity topics.