{"id":33604,"date":"2018-11-17T21:04:31","date_gmt":"2018-11-17T21:04:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/?p=33604"},"modified":"2018-11-18T03:52:24","modified_gmt":"2018-11-18T03:52:24","slug":"policing-with-empathy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/?p=33604","title":{"rendered":"‘Policing with empathy’"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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The dictionary defines empathy this way: The ability to understand and share the feelings of another.<\/em><\/p>\n

I knew the rough definition of the word when I noticed this morning this police car parked on the edges of a children’s festival in Fairview, Texas, where my wife and I had taken our granddaughter, Emma.<\/p>\n

My first thought was that “Policing with Empathy” is one of the more unique law enforcement slogans I had seen. The usual fare declares PDs’ intent to “protect and serve.” Some of them in Texas have appropriated the phrase found on our currency: In God We Trust.<\/p>\n

So, nosey guy that I am, I waited for the officer who belonged to the police cruiser toreturn to her vehicle. I approached her and asked her about the slogan, specifically, “What does it mean?”<\/p>\n

Her initial answer was a bit vague. “We already have established that we trust in God,” she said, “so we now say we have empathy when we’re on duty.”<\/p>\n

OK, I said \u2026 but what does it mean to “police with empathy”? I mentioned to the young officer that empathy suggests that one has an understanding of what someone else is going through, perhaps because they’ve experienced it, too.<\/p>\n

She agreed. It’s a form of “community policing,” she said.<\/p>\n

Fairview PD serves a Collin County community of more than 8,000 residents. Judging from all the hardware the officer this morning was wearing, my hunch is that the police department is well-equipped to handle any kind of call that officers must answer.<\/p>\n

“We don’t want to approach a situation” where the officer instantly throws someone to the pavement, she said. “The chief knows what kind of officer he wants to hire,” she said.<\/p>\n

Oh, the chief? He is\u00a0Granver Tolliver, who — according to the Fairview website — brings more than 30 years of policing experience to his job. I will presume that with three decades of service under his belt, Chief Tolliver has damn near seen it all.<\/p>\n

So, I got yet another education on the nuances of community policing. I am a big fan of the policy. I have seen how it works and my sense is that police departments that build relationships with the community they serve are better able to protect them when the need arises.<\/p>\n

It helps, too, for officers to have empathy<\/em> with those they serve.<\/p>\n\n

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The dictionary defines empathy this way: The ability to understand and share the feelings of another. I knew the rough definition of the word when I noticed this morning this police car parked on the edges of a children’s festival in Fairview, Texas, where my wife and I had taken our granddaughter, Emma. My first … Continue reading ‘Policing with empathy’<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[1088,8120],"class_list":["post-33604","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-local-news","tag-community-policing","tag-fairview-police-department"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33604","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=33604"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33604\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":33610,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33604\/revisions\/33610"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=33604"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=33604"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=33604"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}