Ada County Sheriff's Office-Boise State University Partnership: Final Report

• NCJ Number: 187354
• Author(s): Vaughn Killeen; Gil Wright; Ted Bowers; Gary Raney; Ron Freeman; Dan Bohner; Kjeld Guglielmetti; Bill Chalk; John Crank; Cary Heck; Wendy Christensen
• Date Published: September 1998
• Length: 188 pages
• Grant Number(s): 1996-IJ-CX-0085
• Agencies: NIJ-Sponsored
• Publication Type: Program/Project Description

Annotation

In 1996, the Sheriff's Office in Ada County, Idaho, began exploring ways to increase citizen input into its activities, and the development of citizen input was initiated with a partnership grant provided by the National Institute of Justice in January 1997 and culminated in the restructuring of patrol activities under a decentralized "beat integrity" model in 1998.

Abstract

The Sheriff's Office elected to convert the entire patrol division to a problem-oriented policing (POP) model of proactive policing. Patrol was restructured, personnel were transferred, and evaluation procedures were implemented. The partnership grant became a chronicle of the transition to a POP model. In 1996, the Sheriff's Office began exploring ways of encouraging citizen involvement. The need for police-citizen linkages in Ada County had become especially important due to intense population migration in traditionally rural areas of the county and a sharp increase in crime over a relatively short period. A meeting with the Sheriff's Office and faculty members at Boise State University identified ways of meeting service needs, and the result was a partnership between the two organizations. The following primary by-products of the partnership were carried out during the funding period: (1) a survey of citizen fear of crime and satisfaction with sheriff services; (2) the development of an Internet site to transmit information to the public and to encourage police-citizen interaction; and (3) the preparation of a report on performance criteria under a POP model. Secondary by-products included a community gang prevention team survey and an assessment of citizen attitudes toward sheriff services. Scholarly by-products focused on fear of crime and police work and culture in the rural setting. Additional information on the partnership grant is provided in two appendixes. Tables and figures