Summary
This document detailed the policies, training, tactics, and recommendations for equipment amount to significant, fundamental changes in a police department’s operations and culture. It is important that these changes be undertaken in a comprehensive manner, and not in a piecemeal or haphazard way. The policy changes must be backed up with thorough, integrated retraining of all officers. These changes have implications for officer safety. This approach can increase officer safety, as well as the safety of community members, by teaching officers how to “slow down” some incidents and avoid escalating situations to the point where officers or members of the public are endangered. But to better protect officers, agencies must provide comprehensive new training, new tactical skills, and new equipment to support the new policies.