Timeline: 1982-1984Howard L. Rogers is appointed chief of police on January 4. During his first year, Chief Rogers completely reorganizes the department, increasing four divisions to five, and creating a number of specialty units reporting to the chief.
The Department helps initiate and plays a role in several new community-based organizations, such as the Residential Crime Prevention Committee, the Police/Clergy Crisis Team, the Evanston Citizens Police Association, and the Police/University Consortium. The Chicago Crime Commission recognizes the Residential Crime Prevention Committee for its contributions to the community.
Most of the programs initiated in conjunction with the department’s Police/Community Comprehensive Crime Prevention Program now are fully underway, such as foot patrols, security surveys, crime prevention training/seminars, neighborhood watches, and property identification. Among these strategies, two are especially innovative: a crime prevention newsletter and a crime prevention curriculum.
The ALERT Crime Prevention Newsletter —recognized nationally—provides detailed crime information for each police beat, broken down by type of crime, date, street, and block number. The Department is the first to release and distribute such location-specific crime data to its community. In addition, the newsletter contains articles delineating methods of crime prevention. The ALERT is distributed by block clubs throughout Evanston .
The School-Focused Delinquency Prevention Program, designed for primary and middle schools, is intended to help youth avoid involvement in delinquent activity and to teach them how to avoid becoming victims of crime.
Bulletproof vests—purchased through funds raised by Evanston ’s Kiwanis Club—become part of the standard equipment issued to each officer at time of hire.
The Records Bureau begins September 1 using PIMS (Police Information Management System), a fully automated record-keeping system. The manual system runs in tandem with PIMS through the balance of the year. Through PIMS, data from field and arrest reports is electronically transmitted from terminals at the police station to a central computer in Chicago , where it is stored and processed. Many police departments in the Chicago metropolitan area use PIMS, thereby increasing the amount of information shared among them. [See 1980.]
Terry Gough is named the department’s first full-time crime analyst to track crime patterns and trends via computer. Previously, crime patterns were analyzed using manual methods, and the task was merely one facet of a position handling a variety of functions.
1983
The police department begins sponsoring Law Enforcement Explorer Post 921 in April. Explorer scouts are a division of the Boy Scouts of America for young men and women age 14 through 20. The post is started to provide interested youth with hands on experience in law enforcement careers and the criminal justice system, and to promote character development and citizenship training.
