CCSO implements established standards to strengthen community and police relations

WILMINGTON — The Clinton County Sheriff’s Office (CCSO) recently adopted tougher standards to improve and strengthen community and police relations, according to Sheriff Ralph D. Fizer, Jr.

Sheriff Fizer said the sheriff’s office’s comprehensive effort to meet these evolving standards was formally recognized last fall when the CCSO was certified by the Ohio Community Policing Advisory Board (Ohio Collaborative ) for meeting his first gender standards in the Buckeye State.

Sheriff Fizer said the standards focus on several areas, including appropriate use of force, recruiting and hiring agencies, bias-based policing, car chases and carrier training.

“While we have always been a policy-focused agency, having standards that address these essential law enforcement functions is paramount to having and maintaining a professional organization,” Sheriff Fizer said. “Every law enforcement agency is different based on local demographics and these standards provide common direction whether you are a rural law enforcement agency or in a large city.”

Ohio has worked determinedly to improve community-police relations and find solutions to tensions and concerns between community members and the police who serve them, Sheriff Fizer concluded.

The Ohio Collaborative Standards aim to hold everyone accountable and inspire greater public confidence and are the result of a partnership between the Buckeye State Sheriffs Association and the Association of Chiefs of Police from Ohio.

More than 500 of Ohio’s 900 law enforcement agencies have been certified, which means more than 29,000 officers (representing more than 86% of all Ohio law enforcement officers, including most metropolitan areas in Ohio) are employed by an agency involved in some form of the certification process.

In 2014, then-Governor John R. Kasich created the Ohio Community-Police Relations Task Force after a series of incidents in Ohio and across the countries have highlighted the challenges of interactions between community members and the police.

The task force included 24 members representing the governor, legislature, attorney general, Ohio Supreme Court, law enforcement, labor, local community leaders, faith community, businesses, municipalities and prosecutors.

In 2015, after a series of public forums across the state, the task force delivered its final report to the governor, who in turn created the new advisory council – a 12-person group of law enforcement experts. law and community leaders from across the state.

For more information about this effort, contact Sheriff Fizer by email at [email protected] or by phone at (937) 382-6611.