Citizens Asked to Rate Gwinnett County Police Officers

Individuals who have encounters with Gwinnett County Police Department officers soon will be able to rate how they felt the interactions went as part of the National Police Research Platform’s Police Community Interaction (PCI) Survey, administered by the University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC).

In the upcoming weeks, GCPD will be offering many of the individuals with whom they come into contact with an opportunity to participate in a survey designed to collect information that could help improve police procedures and approaches in not only Gwinnett Police, but also in the state and nationwide, according to a news release.

The goal of the PCI, which is administered through UIC's Center for Research in Law and Justice, is to collect data that will help establish new benchmarks for excellence in policing and thus help to improve the quality of police services delivered to the community. The Gwinnett County Police Department is one of approximately 100 agencies to participate in this innovative national program. Based on a pilot program that is part of the National Police Research Platform administered by UIC researchers, participating agencies will be able to use the survey data to monitor their performance and improve their training programs.

Participating in the survey will be simple. As police reports are filed, a letter will be sent to community members asking them to take a survey. The survey is available in Spanish and English and can be taken either online, or by telephone.  The online survey can be accessed through a computer or by scanning a QR code with a smart phone or tablet device. The letters will include a special code needed to participate in the survey and ensure that only one survey is completed for each encounter.

According to Chief of Police Charles Walters, no one asked to participate in the survey should be concerned that the information could be used in other ways. None of the survey information will be collected by the Gwinnett County Police Department since all survey responses will be managed by the UIC researchers. The results provided to the agency will not include any information identifying the individual responding to the survey or the officer involved in the contact.

Police encounters that involve traffic accidents and stops, as well as most non-violent crimes, will be part of survey. However, encounters that result from domestic violence or sexual assault or involve juveniles will not be surveyed. We sincerely hope that anyone who has had an interaction with one of our officers and receives the letter will take the survey and provides us with honest feedback. Only then can we truly understand how our officers are interacting with the community and implement changes where they are needed.

The above is a news release from the Gwinnett County Police Department.