(dramatic swooshing) (upbeat music) - Welcome to At Issue.

I'm H Wayne Wilson.

Thank you so much for joining us.

The traditional definition of police officer the way we view an officer is they come to take care of traffic accidents and violent acts, things of that nature.

They respond and that's going to change in the city of Peoria because the new Police Chief wants officers to be proactive and to develop a relationship, but officers can't do it alone, so they're relying on people who reach out to young people, in particular, to set them on the proper path and we're going to have a conversation about what that path looks like with both the Police Chief, Eric Echevarria.

Thank you for joining us again on At Issue.

- Thank you for having me.

- And also with us, Donna Crowder.

Donna is with the Tri-County Urban League, but is heavily involved with helping young people find that path.

Thank you for being with us.

- Thank you for having me.

- Let's define how you want to re-image the police officer in Peoria.

- Well, what I don't want is I don't wanna keep just reacting to what we see, so we have to proactively engage our community a different way and to get in front of some of the issues of violence that we continue to see in the city.

But we also, you know, no matter how proactive we are, we need the community to react to our proactive request of them.

- So you need help on all levels, but in particular, you're looking at engaging young people.

- Yeah, so we wanna engage everybody, but we definitely need to engage our youth.

We need to hear them, we need to hear their concerns.

We often as adults.

I mean, I think we could all remember that we didn't think that our parents knew anything, we didn't think the adults knew anything.

And so that hasn't changed, that hasn't changed.

Kids still feel the same way, right?

Kids are kids.

And so we need to hear them at their level.

What are they seeing?

What are their concerns?

And can we, as a city, as a police department, move forward alongside them being considerate of what they feel.

- And this is particularly important because it is the young people, more and more young people are skilling young in terms of people turning to violence.

- Correct, correct.

So we're seeing kids at a younger age involved in violence, but not just involved in violence, they're also victims of violence and they're seeing things in and around them and they need to, how do they deal with it?

You know, we as adults deal with violence a certain way and trauma a certain way, and kids are going to react to trauma in what they're seeing a different way so we have to be in touch with them.

We have to figure out how we can help them so they're not continued to be in the circle of violence themselves.

- So from abroad, let's take the broad view first, Donna, and then we'll get into some more specifics, but to the Chief's point that they see violence, young people, they walk to school, they know that an event took place at that house or at that intersection so they're surrounded by this in many cases.

How do you reach out to these young people?

What's the first step to say, "It's not all bad."

- In my opinion, my first step with them is making a strong relationship with them so they'll be able to have confidence in you and trust that you are advocate for them.

Most children by fifth grade have already experienced some very intimate trauma or death.

Children, it's alarming to know that how numb children have become to death and/or having something very traumatizing happened in their lives.

So I think in order to have them to be able to express themselves, they have to have a sense of a safe space to be able to say that and be able to express their feelings.

- I understand that, and we're talking about fifth and sixth graders, seventh graders, young people.

- Yes, primary.

- And that some of them actually expect their mother to bury them.

- The life expectancy of an average teenager now is like 17 if you, they don't live for like, they just live for today.

They don't expect, they don't have dreams of like, when we were little, like when I grew up, I wanna be, so you wanna be that light for them.

You wanna be able to express that there is more to life than what they may see or have experienced.

- It they live for today, then what steps do you take to try to get them to see there can be a future?

Even though you're in fifth grade, there is a future for you.

- Showing them different ways than just being positive, helping them with the things that they may not be able to navigate on their own.

Sometimes children are passed along and a lot of them deal with very traumatizing situations as in maybe not being raised by their mother.

A lot of kids are in DCFS custody so they may have experienced some very traumatizing situations of being passed along so when a child doesn't know how to navigate, you know, feelings that they have, it's expressed in, you know, getting in trouble at school or being disrespectful.

So when you can come and be able to stand alongside them and be their cheerleader and say, "Hey, that wasn't the right thing to do, but doing this will get a better response."

I found that really helps a lot of them that's going down the wrong path.

- We wanna talk about some more of those things, including afterschool programs, but let me have the Chief talk about that same topic in terms of young people have this initial image of, "Oh, that's a police officer, there must be something happening around this neighborhood there wasn't too good."

How do you build that, help them build respect for themselves and for the office?

- I'll start by saying this.

Last week I met with students at every high school here, the public school and the charter school, and I asked them now, one question that I asked them was "Have any of you know somebody that been killed or hit by gunshots?"

100% of the students that I met with responded with a yes, they have.

And so, you know, what they're seeing then is this is what the police are responding to and this is what they see.

We're only there when we're responding to something that's happening that's bad and we need to get in front of these children and these young adults at the early stage and let them know that we're here for them, that we're here to help them, that we care.

You know, it's personal when I think about it.

I could have been one of those kids, right?

You know, I could speak that I know what it's like to come from a community similar to there's, a family that didn't have money, friends that were engaged in activities they shouldn't have, so I also could have been one of them and that was very fortunate not to be and they need to see that.

They need to understand that I'm not the only police officer that could have been their circumstance and so I have just on the 200 officers at the Peoria Police Department and they all have a story that they can share with these kids and we need to be able to share that and let them see that there is a way out, there's an escape, there's other things in life than just maybe just Peoria and what they've seen here.

- Let me talk about a couple of examples of where it might be putting an officer in a different light for these young people and one would be the Resident Officer Program.

- Absolutely.

- So, and there are five of them right now?

- Correct.

- And you actually were a Resident Officer.

- Yes, I was not here in Peoria.

- [H Wayne Wilson] In Elgin.

- In Elgin, yes, I did it for nine years.

I lived in three different houses and then I was a Sergeant overseeing the unit for another three years before I moved down to be a Lieutenant.

And it's a program that is near and dear to me.

It's not going anywhere as long as I'm here.

I'd like to make a bigger if I could, but I think it really puts us in a different position because we are now a neighbor in those communities and so the kids see that.

And I tell the officers all the time, "We need to be at the schools.

We should be at the churches.

We should be at those community areas where we can get our fingers on the pulse of the community."

And then living there, it just, you're outside taking care of your house, the kids see that.

You're walking into the schools.

Your kids may be going to the same schools, using the same parks, going to the local grocery stores and they see that, and they see that you come and go and you say "hi" and you say "bye" and they see you out on your grill, they see you outside playing with your kids and you become a real person and not just this figure in a uniform.

- And for those, being that there are only five of them, for those that aren't a resident officers, are there opportunities for them to walk with neighbors, things of that nature?

- Absolutely, we started a, I want to call it a campaign, but this is where we're gonna continue to do this as our Walk and Talk Program where we're going out into the community from every division in the police department, officers come into a neighborhood that we've picked, and we're gonna go walk through that neighborhood, knock on doors, talk to the neighbors, introduce ourselves, "Hey, how you doing?

I'm such and such and here's some resources.

How can I help you?"

We want to be in front of them on a positive note.

It's been very, very positive.

- How easy has it been for officers who have been, you're from Elgin.

- Yeah.

- And officers have been here for quite some time.

They have to make a kind of change in approach to the way they are an officer.

- Correct.

- [H Wayne Wilson] Are they receptive to this?

- I think so, yes.

I mean, the first one we did, we started at the TAF homes and we went off our data, which were the areas the most active areas, if you will, that we should walk into and I walked out to the first briefing and I said, "You're probably thinking what's this crazy Chief asking you to do, just go knock on somebody's door."

I said, "Just trust the process."

From day one, the officers came back with a positive account of what occurred.

They found people that needed a job.

They actually helped a gentlemen get the work for two months and take them and bring them back from work, gave him a ride.

We provide a furniture for some families, provided some groceries for some families.

And so they were able to see, it worked both ways.

The officers were able to see that the community indeed wants to talk to us.

They want to share with us.

They want to see us in their neighborhood.

And the community got to see that the officers do care.

Nobody asked the officers or forced the officers to go above and beyond and help somebody find a job, go find some furniture, this came from them.

They saw a need and they filled that gap and filled that need.

- So Donna, let's talk about some of the things that the community can provide to young people.

Let's start with the afterschool programs.

The initial view would be, well, they need someplace to stay for a couple of hours until the parent gets home from work, what have you, but it's really structured.

- It is.

Most of them are two hours there, right after school, and the first hour they're doing tutoring.

The next hour they'll do activities.

But a lot of times some of the kids just need basic things.

A lot of them during the school day, when they come in, it may just be that they don't have a clean uniform.

Some little girl may just need assistance with her hair being combed.

So a lot of times it's just those basic things to help them to get through the day.

During the two hours after school when they do the tutoring, tutoring is just to kind of catch them up on anything they may be behind in.

The next hour's activities.

Activities can range from dance to boxing to craft and arts and craft or anything.

We kind of tailor it to like we have a list when they first start of what they like to do and then in those check boxes that the majority of those things that are voted on are the activities that we provide for them.

- And I assume you see progress during the school year that maybe they improve a grade in a particular class or et cetera, and then does that give you an opportunity to say, "You're doing well."

- Yes, for everyone it's different.

Some, a lot of them, they may have behavior issues so we take them like one step at a time.

Like for some of them, if they're constantly getting referrals to the office, if he did like a couple of days, we take them like, you know, slow as we can.

Like, if some of them, if it's a two or three days you didn't go to the office, it's like, you know, "Way to go."

Then in that time he goes a week, he goes another week.

If you know somebody's watching you, I mean, they're still kids, they just want to be praised and, you know, told they're doing really good and so, well, you know, kind of assist them, probably give them some little extra chips or something, you know, just something just to let them know, reward that, you know, you're on track.

- Let's talk about some common characteristics though that to identify the potential of a student becoming violent.

We have some graphics to show the audience and we'll let the audience read through those graphics as we pop them up.

There's two different pages, but in particular on this first one, talk of hopelessness is one that struck me.

These children are expressing hopelessness?

- Yeah, at a very young age and sometimes some of them are just due to life and home situations.

Now we're into an era where the parents are younger, so you can only do what you know.

A lot of parents are young so there may not be, you know, the quality of parent that we all may be used to when we came up so a lot of times children are lacking a lot of things that is needed for structure.

So the hopelessness that you see when you look into the eyes of like a third grader that, you know, don't have hope for tomorrow, or may be hungry, and so when they have those things that their basic needs aren't being met, you know, runs deep for hopelessness.

And when you talk to teenagers that don't think they're gonna make it to be a man or to even have a career, the hopelessness is just unbelievable.

- We have a second graphic to show you with some other common characteristics of potentially violent students and one I'd like you to address, Donna, is we're talking about young people and yet past violent behavior.

They've maybe already been violent in their lives at a young age.

- And you will see that kind of in the classroom when they start with very violently hitting, throwing things and that can come as soon as like kindergarten.

And then as it progressed is the violent attacking of another student just without any regard for human nature.

- Chief, let's talk again about officers reaching out and presenting themselves in a different light and you had an opportunity recently that Renaissance at Bradley University's campus where there was a series of basketball games, but it was more important than that.

It was much broader than just officers being at a basketball game.

- Correct, so the coach from Quest invited the police department to be part of this Prevent Violence Campaign that he came up with.

And, you know, we signed the pledge along with the students and the officers were in attendance and there to support and actually escort the team to the game to show support and that we're part of them and that we're gonna be part of them.

We're part of this community alongside them.

- There was actually an escort to get to Renaissance.

- Correct.

And it's Coach Dickinson, I believe, is it?

- It is.

- Is the coach there.

And so what, how do you, I mean, you're escorting them to a basketball game.

- Correct.

- What are you doing?

This the kids.

"What are you doing?

Why would you do this?"

- We want to show the kids that we value them.

They're important to us.

The kids, when we had this meeting at the school, there was a couple of students that were apprehensive on even meeting us and I think it's, we were, and it's funny, we were there.

I had a crew of officers with me, including my Assistant Chief, the Lieutenant over investigations, lieutenants over special investigations, a couple sergeants.

And, you know, the Assistant Chief and I were kind of going back and forth on who's better at basketball 'cause we were talking to the basketball players, and on our way out, the kids were in the gym playing basketball.

Have no clue who, to this moment I don't know if this was a gym class or what it was, but they were in there playing basketball.

So let's all go in there and let's have a three-point shootout.

And we, it was just holistically happened.

It wasn't planned.

We went in and I won't tell you who made the three-pointer and who won, but the kids were taking pictures.

The kids that were apprehensive of us took videos and they had a great time with us at that point during that time.

- May I assume that you did not win the three-pointer?

- Oh no, that'd be a bad assumption, that would be a bad assumption.

- [H Wayne Wilson] Now we know.

- That would be a bad assumption.

- [Donna] Now we know who won.

- That would be a bad assumption, but the children that were there, the kids that were there, just had a great time with it.

We just walked in and we're in our uniforms and we just kind of took over a little bit and the kids were applauding it and cheering along and I think we made some new friends.

- Donna, you mentioned parents earlier in the conversation.

Once you develop a relationship with a child, do you reach out to the parent?

- It's critical.

It's critical to reach out to the parent to be able to keep the foundation of the entire relationship successful.

As much as we pour into kids, if we don't tap into the parents, they lose that when they go home.

And a lot of times the parents are in need of resources to be able to be productive and just as successful as we want the child, so to make it a full circle that you have to reach out to the parents and be able to address the needs of them.

- I found a survey that was done by New York University that studied 242 cities, the officers in 242 cities over a long period of time, 1981 to 2018.

And the result was that in general, this isn't true in every single case, but in general the result was more officers might not keep people safer in a community.

It's not about putting a whole bunch of police officers out there.

So what is it that might reduce crime in terms, I mean, Patrick Urich in the City Council aren't going to say, "Chief, we got 20 more officers for you, here you go.

- Right, right.

I think what it is is put in the officers in the right places.

I don't think it's let's just send everybody to go out and make traffic stops and let's go send everybody out to write tickets or just make arrest.

We need to be out there doing some different things, really being proactive and looking at, how do we engage our youth?

How do we engage our seniors?

How do we engage with the clergy?

How do we engage our community?

And how do we show them that we really care and want to be part of it?

I think when you establish relationships, it makes the job easier.

People start to trust the police.

We have to build trust, no matter what we do.

If we can't build trust and the community doesn't feel safe, we're not progressing.

They have to feel safe.

- I'd like both of you to respond to this particular issue and that is you can't do this alone and there are other people who of course do the same thing you do, but there aren't enough of you because there's so many young people.

What do you want from the community?

What do you think the community can do to step forward?

- I think a lot of times people that want to help maybe not know where, how and where to go to help.

If people just getting involved with the school in the area.

We're getting ready now with a group that the Chief started to have women to just go at lunchtime just to make relationships, just being consistent with the children.

If they constantly see you, eventually a relationship will emerge.

So I think just getting involved would just be everything, you know, just getting involved with different, you know, there's so many different groups and I think a lot of times people just don't know or, you know, where they may fit in or what's needed.

- In the case for a parent who might be working two jobs and they don't know where to turn when they need something and 211 is a great resource in Peoria.

So there are agencies.

Do you help the young child and the parent or parents connect to those agencies for a particular need?

- We do, at Tri-County Urban League we assist individuals with a multitude of things.

Like we have one parent that may need daycare a little longer, like she didn't get off until like 7:30, so sometimes it's all about just meeting them where they are.

Like there's no one size that fits all because what one parent need, the other may need something different.

Another parent needed assistance with going back to school.

She wanted to become, she was a CNA and she wants to become an RN.

So it's just about connecting everybody with the resources that's for them, so if it was, and I just so happened to know an RN to be able to help her to just navigate through that course a little easier.

So I think if we, a lot of times people think that they're not needed when something that they have would really assist a parent that's in need of some type of resource or service.

- And Chief, what do you want from the community?

- I need more Donna Crowders.

That's what I need.

I need more people like her that are willing to step up and fill in the gap where it's needed.

If you see something, say something, come in, how can you be of assistance to the police?

So how can we partner up?

Donna has been phenomenal in reaching out and really establishing relationship and helping connect those dots.

I'm new in the community and who do I need to connect with and who do the officers need to connect with?

And she's been phenomenal, phenomenal at doing that for me, but I need more people like that who aren't scared to say, "There's issues in our community and I'm willing to step up and help the police department where I can."

- You've said in the past that you have an open door policy.

- [Eric Echevarria] I do.

- If somebody wants to help out, you know, maybe orchestrating a Walk and Talk or whatever, do they call you?

- They can definitely call my office and I'm hard to find in the office.

- [H Wayne Wilson] Christina.

- Christina Kirby is there.

She can connect me to whoever I need to connect to.

And so, yeah, I haven't, there hasn't been a lack of people calling my office, believe me, so people know there's an open door policy.

- And for you, Donna, the Chief said, "I need more Donald Crowders."

If there are people out there that said, "Well, I might be able to help with an afterschool program one day a week or every other week," where do they go?

I mean, you talked about people in need don't know where to turn, the person who's willing to help may not know where to turn.

- They can contact me, I'm in Tri-County Urban League even on Saturdays, they can contact Tri-County Urban League.

There's a need for tutors, for parents and GED, and for afterschool.

There's always a need just, yeah, just call.

There's always a need and just to connect, just to connect with children.

Children just need to know that someone's there.

- And Donna Crowder at Tri-County Urban League or Chief Eric Echevarria at the Peoria Police Department.

Ask Christina Kirby.

- Yes, she'll put you in contact.

- [H Wayne Wilson] Chief, thank you so much for being on At Issue.

- Thank you.

- [H Wayne Wilson] And Donna Crowder, thank you for joining us as well.

- Thank you for having me.

- We appreciate your being here for the conversation.

We hope that this has given you some inspiration to take another step and we'll be back next time with another edition of At Issue.

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