Hartford Police Restore Patrol and Community Patrols – NBC Connecticut

Hartford is reinstating community policing, including three patrol departments across the city.

“Community policing will be a central part of our public safety strategy,” Mayor Arunan Arulampalam (D) of Hartford said Friday during a press conference at City Hall.

Arulampalam and acting police chief Kenny Howell said 20 officers would be deployed to patrol the communities.

This includes five officers patrolling Albany Avenue, Park Street and downtown.

Howell said the department focuses on areas with high crime or quality of life issues and may add more areas as staffing levels increase.

Civilian Police Review Board Chairman Eric Crawford is confident the changes can improve relations with the city, noting that officers have been able to connect with people as they walk through neighborhoods.

“Back when there were still patrolmen walking the streets, meeting the grandmothers and aunts, sitting on the steps, getting a cup of Kool-Aid or maybe a sandwich,” he said. “They became part of the community.”

The department is still about 100 officers short of full strength, and some wonder if the reshuffle will make any difference.

“How can there be a community patrol if you don’t have enough manpower or womanpower?” asked Cornell Lewis, founder of the Self-Defense Brigade.

Lewis’ group includes citizens who have armed themselves to police their neighborhoods. He said this began when residents became frustrated with Hartford police.

“There seems to be a gap between the police and the community, and community activists are filling that gap,” Lewis said.

Arulampalam hopes the patrol officers can help repair the police’s relationship with the city. He also said police-community relations are a nationwide problem, not just in Hartford.

“I would say it’s a nationwide trend of lack of connection,” he said.

Crawford believes Hartford’s problems are local in nature and not the result of a nationwide trend. Still, he is confident things are moving in the right direction under a new mayor who is looking for a new permanent chief.

“Hartford is a little different,” Crawford said. “We’re smaller and I think we can get things done faster.”

Arulampalam also announced an investigation into the filing of police reports after he and Howell noticed that some reports were difficult to find.

The city hires the firm Shipman & Goodwin to investigate the case.

Arulampalam declined to speculate on the issue, including whether reports are missing or whether the problem is due to filing errors.

Crawford said the city should focus on how to prevent the problem in the future.

“Instead of looking back at what happened, we should take steps to ensure that it does not happen again,” he said.