Emanuel, McCarthy Plan To Revitalize CAPS Program
By Chuck Sudo in News on Jan 9, 2013 3:30PM
Photo credit: City of Chicago/Brooke Collins
Mayor Rahm Emanuel and Chicago Police Superintendent Garry McCarthy announced a plan to reinvigorate the Community Alternative Policing Strategy (CAPS) program by moving resources for the program from Police Department headquarters to the district level and giving commanders the autonomy to customize the programs to best fit the needs of their districts.
The nearly 20-year-old program has fallen on hard times in recent years and Emanuel and McCarthy hope the plan to decentralize CAPS will lead to new relationships between police and the communities they serve. Emanuel said the program had become bogged down by bureaucracy that distracted from fighting crime.
“It became an office that was as big and as bloated in the downtown [headquarters] as we had in the districts, and that clearly was a misguided set of priorities. It was something that just grew over the years, and nobody basically cared about it,” Emanuel said.
Emanuel said in a statement announcing the move.
“Community policing is a philosophy, and the strength of that philosophy within the Chicago Police Department and in our communities is more critical now than ever before,” said Mayor Emanuel. “CAPS is an important partnership between residents and police, and it’s time to revitalize the program by giving District Commanders responsibility and authority to tailor programs for individual communities.”
Under the new plan, each police district will be assigned a CAPS sergeant, two police officers and a community organizer, along with access to a youth service provider and area coordinator. Each will be trained in community policing strategies, including procedural justice and police legitimacy. 2,500 officers and 400 recruits have already been trained for the program.
Former Mayor Richard M. Daley had similar sentiments about CAPS prior to his leaving office and wound u cutting the budget to the program, leaving it on life support.