A study on a community policing initiative: Police-community consultative committees.

Abstract

Police-community consultative committees illustrate the enhanced community responsibility and participation in policing efforts. The primary objectives of these groups are to increase communication between the police and the community, to improve police/community relations, and serve as a forum where the community and police can share information and mutually identify concerns. In this study, the emergence of police-community consultative committees in Ottawa-Carleton is examined within the context of police partnerships. This thesis focuses on five police community consultative committees in the Ottawa-Carleton region. The findings suggest that police representatives on the committees have made commendable efforts to establish partnerships between the police and the community, but obstacles appear to hinder the process. These obstacles include a perception among many of the police representatives that there is a lack of organizational support for community policing, that committee members may not be clear as to their roles and responsibilities on consultative committees, and that committees may not be representative of the community they represent. (Abstract shortened by UMI.)