Dean Esserman

Effective policing is not flashing a badge, it’s letting people get to know the officer behind the badge, the police chief of Providence, R.I., told students, faculty and community members gathered Thursday at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga.

“To see the police as simply enforcers of the law is to miss the point of what most officers are doing,” said Col. Dean Esserman, who served as police chief in New Haven and Stamford, Conn. before coming to Providence in 2003. “It is about relationships.”

Col. Esserman, a guest of the Community Research Council and UTC’s political science and criminal justice departments, said he attributed a five-year drop in crime in his city to increasing partnerships with individual neighborhoods and residents.

This is a concept widely known as “community policing,” which Col. Esserman described in a separate interview as “the new American policing.”

Chattanooga Police Chief Freeman Cooper, who was out of town Thursday, said in a phone interview that he, too, feels strongly about community policing.

“We don’t necessarily have precincts in every single neighborhood, but it’s about knowing communities and going to community meetings,” Chief Cooper said.

He said his officers attend neighborhood meetings here weekly to touch base with residents and hear about the problems specific to their areas.

“It’s definitely important,” Chief Cooper said, “and it’s something that we’ve maintained for some 10, 15 years.”

Ekendra Evans, a UTC senior, said she supports that type of policing. After attending Col. Esserman’s talk, she said she hopes local law enforcement officials would be as inspired as she was by the colonel’s desire to “break down to the real community level.”

“A lot of people don’t like the police anymore, so I think it’s a good idea,” she said.

UTC Police Chief Bob Ratchford also attended the talk and said he has been looking at ways he can get his officers to become less anonymous on campus.

“We do not need to just ride around in cars all day with the windows up,” Chief Ratchford said.