The importance of mindset in policing | Chip Huth | TEDxTacoma

hello good afternoon my name is chip youth and I've been a law enforcement officer for the past 24 years and for most of that time I have police problems not people as we're all aware law enforcement is come under deep scrutiny in the wake of recent significant events in our country some of these high-profile events have contributed to a lack of trust in the police on the part of many community members and for most of my career I've been part of that problem but over the last several years in Kansas City we've been on a journey a journey learning to apply new ways of policing that have been transformational particularly for me and the members of my team with the real urgency to find solutions to our biggest problems I want to share how this transformation occurred for us and what it is meant in Kansas City I'm here because I know what has happened with us can happen anywhere when I first became a SWAT team member our city's West Side community was deeply burdened with high volume crime many businesses that relocated in the streets resembled open sewers most of the criminals blended in with groups of undocumented workers and preyed on them and other citizens who were too fearful to cooperate with the police at one point our SWAT team was brought in with a mandate to clean it up we adopted a zero-tolerance policy toward crime of any kind but the situation continued to decline we police the neighborhood heavily we wrote tickets and made arrests for any violation we observed no matter how minor we were fishing with a net instead of a spear and many hard-working community members got caught up in the sweeps meant to discourage the criminals despite our work the crime rate increased and because of our work some community members began to see us as the enemy I remember one critical thinking officer approaching me and asking chip you do realize what we're doing isn't working right to which I replied yes of course I realize it isn't working but we're the police and this is what we do it was my narrow mindedness that invited community members to complain more and cooperate less a few years later I was promoted and had the opportunity to lead a SWAT team of my own I brought the same mindset I had employed on the Westside with me and it wasn't long before that team was one of the most complain baan units the entire department I was equal parts blind to the needs of the community and the potential of my team it was in the middle of all this that we encountered the ideas of the Arvinder Institute through a partnership with the Institute in our Leadership Academy we began to ask a question do we really see that people were policing as people as we started to ask ourselves this question our team members started to consider what it might be like to be pleased by us as our collective mindset begin to shift so did our results let me illustrate with a few quick stories our team encounters many aggressive dogs during search warrant service operations aggressive dogs pose obvious dangers to the team and the primary way for the team to address them was to shoot them this made the owners of the animals predictably angry and sad relating to the dog owners one Squad member asked this this question of our team he said what if we could serve a warrant on your house without shooting your dog would you want us to well many of the team members are pet owners so you can imagine what the answer was this one question led us to embed a dog expert with our team to learn our jobs and to teach us about dog behavior we also implemented additional technology to capture and restrain aggressive animals this initiative to date has resulted in an 80 percent reduction in dogs being shot on search one executions in Kansas City Missouri our team utilizes patrol wagons to escort suspects to jail these wagons are essentially vans have been converted to haul prisoners a couple of officers were operating these wagons notice that people were complaining about the excessive heat in the summer months as a result they were often angry and unruly and when they got to jail they cause disturbances with the detention people the wagon drivers listen to the complaints of these folks and they actually did an investigation themselves it took upon themselves to look into this they discovered the cabins of the patrol wagons could heat up to dangerous levels on some days but because of the modifications made to the vehicle cool air could not be effectively pumped into the prisoner compartment these officers went to the local hardware store and purchase PVC pipe and duct tape with money out of their own wallets they used the duct tape to attach one into the PVC pipe to the air conditioner vents in the driver's compartment ran the other end of the pipe through the metal mesh into the back of the prisoners compartment this made it possible to push cool air into the back of the wagon providing relief from the heat to the suspects as they were being transported to the detention facility as we started to see people we were policing more and more people who mattered the way we mattered it began to affect what we did is we responded to unique situations in ways we could out of conceived of we were operating from an N word mindset one summer day our team chased a violent Fugitive into an apartment complex the man hid in the ceiling of one of the apartments required us to evacuate the entire building one family was in the middle of making dinner and in their rush to get the safety they weren't able to turn off the stove once the building was evacuated we were able to enter the ceiling space and capture the suspect without endangering the residents a detective assigned to our team noticed the ruined dinner on the family stove he took inventory of everything that was wasted and left the scene as we begin the process of letting folks back into their home's about thirty minutes later that Detective returned with armful of groceries which he delivered to the family whose dinner was ruined the detective had used his personal credit card to replace every single item on the family's dinner menu one day we asked we were asked by the Homicide Unit to serve a warrant on a house looking for a couple of murder suspects we did our homework on the residence I brief the team we rolled out as we made the block we were immediately compromised by lookouts our breacher took the front door off the hinges with the battering ram and we made our way into the living room what we encounter on the other side of that door was complete pandemonium there were approximately 25 people with small children and infants in the home toddlers were literally clinging to our legs as we made our way through the house there were minutes of chaos as he rounded everybody up and consolidated them into a dining room that had been furnished with free couches I tried to address the group however with several small children screaming and mothers frantically trying to calm them the best I could do was try to go from person to person to explain what we were there it was about that time I noticed that my point man was missing I decided I was going to try to find him I imagined he had found some quiet place somewhere in the house to call the detectives I walked into the kitchen and there he was in full tactical gear standing at the sink mixing baby bottles he just looked at me and smiled and kind of shrugged and he went out to the dining room and began distributing the baby bottles to the mothers of the crying infants this one act of responsiveness changed the entire scene everyone calmed down and we were able to explain the situation thoroughly and turn the two suspects over to Detective smoothly all because this officer was able to be responsive in a stressful situation no behavioral mandate new policy or technology prescription can change the way we see others nor can these sterile measures equip officers with the ability to adapt in the moment to provide the approach each unique situation requires the change in the way we see can not only transform a single situation but can transform an entire community let me take you back to the Westside where two officers there began to see people as people after we had abandoned the zero-tolerance policies on the Westside the main responsibility for policing the community felt to to officers these officers engaged community leaders with humility and an open mind they abandon positions and focused on the shared interests of the neighborhood and the police department they began by acknowledging the personhood of each member of the community they saw them as people who counted this shift in mindset opened up possibilities never before considered work to build trust with all community members they begin to differentiate between the day laborers who wanted to work and those who hid among them that were responsible for the majority of the crime in the neighborhood these officers help devise a system where the men seeking work had to report to a community center where they were issued ID cards and provided with food coffee restroom facilities and place to shower those who weren't picked up for work on a given day were dispatched out into the community to perform to perform neighborhood services these two officers worked right alongside of them clearing brush painting houses and even helping neighborhood matriarchs make tamales all the while building critical relationships that were leveraged to help instill security safety and prosperity back into the community the criminals with ill intent became easy to identify and the community began willingly cooperating with the efforts to reduce crime and disorder as their fear of the police dissipated these two officers worked with the community members and fellow officers to drive the crime rate to an all-time low and achieve a national success story that was made possible by a mindset shift that allowed them to see those in the community as people with individual hopes needs fears and dreams a bank restaurants and other neighborhoods and other businesses move back into the neighborhood and the community is engaged and supportive of the police we were facing a huge challenge and we must face it together the solution is simple changing our mindset more than mandating new behaviors deploy new technologies or implementing new policies is what is needed this mindset shift helped our SWAT team capture more illegal drugs and guns in a three-year period than we had in the previous decade while at the same time transforming from the most complained on unit in the department to receiving zero community complaints in six years just to recap that represents a three-fold increase in productivity and a 100 percent reduction in community complaints believe me if we can do it anyone can thank you very much for the gift of your time

Channel: TEDx Talks

Views: 274,273

Keywords: TEDxTalks, English, United States, Social Science, Community, Public Policy, Relationships

Id: 4_29TS6jjsA

Length: 10min 31sec (631 seconds)

Published: Mon Apr 20 2015