Hiding in Plain Sight: Recruiting and retaining into the men's club

For those in the Inland Empire, clean out your rain gutters and your storm drains as the first real Pacific storm comes to town, by Friday.




"Now, here, you see, it takes all the running you can do, to keep in the same place. If you want to get somewhere else, you must run at least twice as fast as that!"


----Lewis Carroll




For the twins in synergy,





Another good book about women in policing is Gender and Policing: Sex, Power and Police Culture by Louise Westmarland, who's a professor of criminology from the United Kingdom. Thousands of miles away and in a different region of the world, the same issues emerge impacting the role of women in policing that are prevalent in the United States.

Westmarland discusses the masculinization of policing, in terms of men having the necessary physical tools while female officers are in need of protection by (rather than from) male officers. A similar attitude that operates alongside the one above, would be the belief that if female officers work with male officers, they are putting every police officer in danger. Talk about overblown drama!

Attitudes which are still pervasive in police agencies in Great Britain even though studies show that the arrest rates of male and female officers for a variety of crimes in different situations with different degrees of violence is very similar.

The treatment of sexual harassment in the workplace is minimal by Westmarland who opts for broader themes in her work.




The National Center for Women and Policing conducted research and created a manual for recruiting and retaining female officers after receiving a grant from the U.S. Department of Justice, Bureau of Justice Assistance. In it, is a lot of useful information for reforming this process in law enforcement agencies. Also discussed is sexual harassment in the workplace.

This report cites that between 60-70% of female officers said they had been sexually harassed in the workplace, but only 4-6% of women reported it to their agencies. The reasons cited for not doing so, not surprisingly, were the Code of Silence that exists inside most law enforcement agencies as well as fear of retaliation by the agency or individuals within it if they did report it. Is it worth reporting it at the risk of throwing your career away, seems to be the question that's most often asked by women who experience sexual harassment.

Because like happens in racial discrimination and harassment cases involving men and women of color in law enforcement agencies, women of all races have faced having internal investigation mechanisms turned against them and investigating them for misconduct after they had turned towards these same mechanisms for redress in terms of investigating misconduct against them. Unfortunately, that's been the case rather than the exception and it begs the question as to whether these internalized mechanisms of investigations are themselves merely gatekeepers for the police culture.

Until this changes, there will be no honest record or accounting of whether or not a police department is truly non-hostile, non-racist, non-sexist and non-homophobic even if the billboard states differently.



Some of the strengths of female officers in the Justice Department's report are the following:


(excerpt)


1.Women officers are proven to be as competent as their male counterparts. Research studies show no meaningful difference between male and female officers in their activities or productivity on patrol, their commitment to law enforcement organizations, their response to violent confrontations, and their performance evaluations received both at the academy and on the job.


2.Women officers use a style of policing that relies less on physical force, and they are less likely to become involved in incidents of excessive force.




3. Women officers bring skills and abilities to the job that help implement community-oriented policing which facilitates communication and trust between police officers and citizens.




4. More women officers will improve a law enforcement agency's response to domestic violence against women--the largest single category of calls to local police departments.


5. Increasing the presence of female police officers reduces the prevalence of sex discrimination, underutilization and sexual harassment within an agency.




Here's a study on the gender gap in the use of excessive force by police officers.


The full guide for Recruiting & Retaining Women: A Self-Assessment Guide for Law Enforcement, all 150+ pages of it, can be downloaded at a link on this page.


Online primer on sexual harassment.






Some of the suggestions for improving the recruitment and retention of female employees including police officers in law enforcement agencies include the following:


(excerpt, recruiting and retention report)



1. Design quality recruit academies and field training programs


The potential for a high number of women "washing out" is in both situations. Screening academy instructors and field training officers to root out biases any of them might have against female officers which might cause them to give them poor evaluations or force them out. There shouldn't be a place for racist and/or sexist training officers because for better or worse, it plays a crucial role in creating the police officers who will carry out the mission of the department. Modify training criteria and training curriculum to reflect difference in learning styles. The "one size fits all" models seldom are very effective and may encourage washing out people that could have been outstanding officers.

It was also important to design programs that were based on what was called, "adult learning" and monitor the process of cadets and officers through these academies and field training programs.



2. Mentoring to increase retention


Councilman Steve Adams from Ward Seven once said at a city council meeting in October 2006 that retention programs were "remedial training for those who can't cut it". But retention strategies including the use of mentoring have been beneficial to both male and female officers, although male officers particularly those who are White have long benefited from less formal and non-official mentoring by senior officers in different law enforcement agencies.

One local law enforcement agency that utilizes a mentoring program is the Fontana Police Department.



3. Value civilian employees


A higher percentage of civilian employees in law enforcement agencies are female compared to sworn employees. Suggestions in the report were to offer them equal pay and benefits and access to training programs used by sworn officers. Others may be to be inclusive in award and recognition programs for the valuable services they provide to the law enforcement agency and to the public. Recognize their contributions to community policing philosophy and public safety.



4. Implement family-friendly programs


The development of family-friendly pregnancy and childcare programs for female employees encourages retention, according to this report. These programs can also be beneficial to male employees as well. These programs should be available and encouraged for all women and men including those wishing to be promoted or placed in different assignments within a law enforcement agency.




5. Monitoring Performance Evaluations


There should be a just and unbiased evaluation program in place for all police officers free of discrimination by race and/or gender. Evaluation criteria should be updated in law enforcement agencies that have adopted a community policing philosophy and strategy to be more inclusive of this vital component of policing when conducting evaluations.




6. Ensuring Impartial Internal Investigation and Discipline Systems


According to Police Chief Magazine, there's different strategies to promote recruitment and retention of women in law enforcement. The article focuses a section on the importance of addressing sexual harassment within law enforcement agencies, using policies and practices within the Albuquerque Police Department as an example.

Below is what that department had in place as of about 1998.


(excerpt)


The APD instituted a zero-tolerance sexual harassment policy by sending a strong, top-down message throughout the department, changing policies and procedures, and providing police-specific training on preventing sexual harassment.

All three shifts were briefed on the importance of tolerance and acceptance of all officers. In addition, all supervisors were briefed on the department's zero-tolerance policy on sexual and racial harassment, and were informed that there would be surprise inspections at substations to check for pin-ups and cartoons. An example was made of one lieutenant who had displayed a racially offensive cartoon on ebonics in his substation.

The promotional exam was also revised to include questions on the department's sexual harassment policies and procedures. The investigation of sexual harassment complaints was moved to an external city agency with expert Equal Employment Opportunity investigators on staff. This would serve to speed up the investigation, ensure impartiality and increase confidence in the process. Officers who made a complaint did not have to go through the chain of command.

Finally, IWITTS developed for sworn supervisors an eight-hour police-specific training session on preventing sexual harassment. The all-day training received top evaluations from participants, who found the case-study format and the analysis of police legal cases especially helpful. (See box at right.)


Not a bad place to start.



7. Assignments and Promotions



The promotional process should be one that's not sexist or biased against women. Women within the law enforcement agency who are qualified should be encouraged to apply for promotional positions, as part of the strategy to break "glass ceilings". This is one area where mentorship programs would be particularly valuable. Women who are in management and supervisory positions should be presented into the community along with their male counterparts including at local government meetings, schools, forums on policing issues within communities and city-wide as well as those involving community organizations.






8. Developing Effective Awards and Recognition Programs



Award and recognition efforts usually don't focus around community-oriented policing styles including awards for officers and community members working on community policing projects. There should be more encouragement of creating awards and recognition programs for police officers and these should employ community input as well, according to the report.



Suggestions very similar to the ones on this list were provided by former Seattle Police Department Chief Norm Stamper in his book, Breaking Rank. He called the labeling of a female police cadet, a "split tail", "a pernicious form of discrimination injected with a large dose of misogyny".



When describing female law enforcement officers, he cited a study by the Police Foundation and the Urban Institute from the 1970s which detailed its findings on female law enforcement officers which are listed below.





(excerpt, Stamper)





1. Women police officers "encountered the same number of dangerous, angry, upset, drunk or violent citizens"



2. Women as a group were more effective than their male peers in avoiding violence and in defusing potentially violent situations.



3. Women made fewer arrests and wrote fewer traffic citations, which did not affect their performance ratings.



4. Women were less likely than men to engage in "serious unbecoming conduct".



5. Women were more likely to be assigned to light duty as a result of injuries, but these injuries did not cause them to be absent fro work more often than men.



6. Women scored the same level of "citizen satisfaction" as their male counterparts.






Stamper's suggestions for improving the recruitment and retention of women in law enforcement match those on other wish lists.



(excerpt, Stamper)



1. Apply standards of equitable treatment which are adhered to at every level of the organization.


2. Offer childcare to employees that operates 24/7.


3. Tailor recruitment to attract female applicants. Send women officers to schools beginning at the elementary school level.


4. For teenagers and young women, offer familiarization and training sessions so they can learn about every part of the job.


5. Inoculate women recruits from "conformity" pressure they will face when they graduate. Teach skills for them to deal with officers who engage in inappropriate conduct.




Law enforcement agencies which implement these suggested reforms, often see increases in terms of both recruiting female officers and in retaining them. There's a lot in law enforcement which is attractive to women as a career. However, if you're a woman, why should you have to add to the challenges of the profession, having to deal with sexual harassment, discrimination and ostracizing?

When asked what kept them away from law enforcement, several studies stated that it was discrimination and sexual harassment. And the fear that if either was reported, retaliation would follow, because too often that is exactly what does happen.

What happens inside police departments in terms of how they address sexual harassment and racism and/or sexism which provide the driving force is often a good indicator of whether or not the law enforcement agency is entrenched in a racist, sexist culture. How does management including the police chief or sheriff handle these issues? How does the leadership of the police labor unions inside an agency handle these issues? Does this leadership hold management accountable for how it handles racial and/or sexual harassment?

Instead, do both condone or even participate in this behavior and the creation and maintenance of a hostile work environment for women? If they do, then all the measures taken to increase recruitment and retention of women won't reap much of anything but then again, if the climate is this toxic against women, these steps won't even be considered let alone taken.

These are questions that probably don't get asked much inside most law enforcement agencies but they should be. In the answers to these questions, lies a lot of the truth about the progression of law enforcement in terms of how it both views and treats female police officers.








Three Los Angeles County Sheriff Department deputies on administrative leave after an inmate in a jail alleged that they pepper sprayed his genitals, according to the Los Angeles Times.


(excerpt)


A sheriff's official said the department's Internal Criminal Investigations Bureau has taken Franco's allegations "very seriously" and is reviewing them. The three jailers have been placed on paid leave during the investigation, but department officials would not identify them or make them available to comment.

"There is a criminal investigation. It's moving along," said Michael Gennaco, chief attorney for the Office of Independent Review, which monitors Sheriff's Department internal affairs investigations under a contract with the county. "If the allegations are true, the consequences are serious. There is no legitimate reason for doing what is alleged here."

Franco said he swore at a deputy who had refused to give him a clean shirt. At the time, Franco was in jail for allegedly violating terms of his probation for a domestic violence conviction.

About 45 minutes after the argument, three deputies removed him from his cell, handcuffed him and took him to a recreation area away from other inmates, Franco said.

One deputy jabbed him in the face, the inmate alleged. Another yanked his T-shirt and asked, "How's this shirt?" Franco said.

Then the deputies ordered him to lie face-down on the pavement. Two held him there, pressing their knees into his back and neck. Then, he said, "my boxer shorts were pulled down and I was pepper-sprayed . . . . "

Franco said he heard a hissing sound and then began to feel severe discomfort.

"My testicles and area down there was burning really bad," he said.

A deputy then warned him not to act up again, Franco said.

"He said, 'You so much as stick your nose out the tray slot [on the cell door] I'll beat you up so bad you'll have to go to [the hospital],' " Franco said.




Drew Peterson, the former Bolingbrook Police Department sergeant whose wife, Stacey, has been missing since Oct. 28 told the Chicago Sun-Times that wives run away all the time.


(excerpt)


"This is just another case of what happened to me happening to someone else," Peterson, the ex-cop whose wife Stacy vanished more than two months ago, said of the case of Anu Solanki. "This happens all the time. I'm just another victim of it."



His wife's missing. His third wife allegedly drowned accidentally in a bathtub in 2004. And Peterson's the real victim.