Integrated DPS and Cross-Training: Rationale of Integrated DPS, Practical Applications of DPS, Rio Rancho, Emmett Township, Sunnyvale (Essay Sample)

Integrated DPS and Cross-training
Name
Institution
Abstract
The literature herein looks at the concept of integrated fire and police department in the context public service delivery within the community in a manner that is collaborative. It evaluates the unique concept of collaborative cooperation and how it has been applied in the public sector in an attempt to protect, prevent, respond to challenges and mitigate them in a joint manner rather than assigning agency related challenges to agencies traditionally assigned to deal with them. Prior to inception of integrated efforts, coordination between agencies was poor due to differences in organizational structure and training. Joint collaboration has since seen elimination of such challenges. Integrated collaboration has received widespread use in a number of cities due to its efficiency and cost effectiveness. Cities such as Sunnyvale have successfully implemented integrated DPS and cross training with remarkable outcome in terms of emergency response. Others smaller geographical areas such as Rio Rancho have had integrated DPS foe a long time and it has had a positive impact in terms of reduction of crime rate and efficient collaboration between responder bodies. This program has enabled equipping of integrated DPs officers with diverse skills which enable functioning in different emergency situations. As a result, there has been a lot of success during situations of emergency.
Integrated DPS and Cross-raining
Introduction
Between 2000 and 2012, Federal bureau of investigation registered 160 cases involving "active shooters”, which took place small sized rural setups as well as large and widespread cities. Of the 160 registered incidences, about 40% fell within the category of mass killings, a term coined by the FBI (Beyerlein et al., 2006). Members of law enforcement accounted for up to 21 fatalities out of 45 in which police officers and suspects engaged each other. One other major challenge is Emergency medical services response (Beyerlein et al., 2006). Nationwide standards relating to response during incidences of distress require workers not to approach scenes that may be dangerous (Beyerlein et al., 2006). The main reason is that EMS does not intend to put its workforce at risk. Therefore, law enforcement officer will do a thorough sweep of scene of incidence prior to allowing EMS into scene.
As a result, it takes ages to perform a thorough sweep of the scene, particularly if the scene is a huge building, Mall or an extensive office block (Beyerlein et al., 2006). Since it is possible that this exercise may take longer than one hour, casualties who have been injured may be left at risk of bleeding to death (Ayers, 1956). Therefore, this research intends to examine joint DPS as well as cross-training of initial responders, such as the police and members of the fire department. There are a number of typologies into which integration can be done ranging from complete, partial and minimal (Beyerlein et al., 2006). A number of large cities in America have established specialized squads made up of police and the fire department. In other cases, members from the EMS are also constituted, even though such cities retain independent structures of both team players (Beyerlein et al., 2006).
Literature Review
Major Issues
Integrated public safety has been in existence for quite a while; beginning in the roman times and has evolved over the years. Most jurisdictions undertake separate emergency response initiatives even though emergencies do not respect disciplinary of jurisdictional boundaries (Beyerlein et al., 2006). Emergency situations require the combined effort of different agencies that are forced to work together in an attempt to deal with a crisis (Frazer,2006). In simple terms, an emergency calls for inter-agency collaboration. Members of the public have a high expectation with regards to coordination between responders from different agencies tasked with ensuring public safety and protection (Beyerlein et al., 2006). However, in most cases joint collaboration between responders becomes antagonistic instead of collaborative (Beyerlein et al., 2006). Coordinated effort between police, EMS and fire department varies greatly across the U.S and is mostly strained.
Rationale of Integrated DPS and cross training
This strained relationship is attributed to the fact that emergencies in most countries have been categorized strictly under relevant agency only. Emergencies have been categorized as fire, police and EMS problems (Beyerlein et al., 2006). This approach has resulted in organization of response to emergencies based on categorization. Since such a categorization has inherent flaws, the result is creation of silos amongst emergency agencies (Hocervar et al., 2006). Silos in this case refer to separation existing between different disciplines or agencies. Unfortunately, emergencies do not respect boundaries that separate different agencies (More, 1970). A severe car accident, shooting, earthquake or a terrorist incident requires multidisciplinary collaboration. Since collaborative deficit may not be solved through use of knowledge, being aware of past failures or incentives geared towards improvement, research shows that the issue of collaboration is not cognitive but structural (More, 1970). Responder bodies are currently organized based on discipline addressing a fraction of an incident or scene of emergency. DPS is a model geared towards solving such a structural technicality through consolidation of efforts (More, 1970). Integration of responder initiatives is not new in the U.S. This structuring of different disciplines together has been in existence in the U.S since the 1900s (More, 1970). Integration of fire and police departments has brought about consolidation of departments forming one organization with responsibility of responding to different forms of emergencies. There exist diverse models which attempt to explain different levels of integration (More, 1970). However, the main idea is that there is one organization made up of diverse disciplines operating under one structure of command (More, 1970).
Standard operating policies inherent within the structure of most EMS workforce within a number of jurisdictions require that personnel do not engage an unsecured scene. This restriction arises from fear of exposing personnel to risky environment yet they are untrained in matters of self-defense (More, 1970). Consequently, there are challenges during a number of ASEs. Commonly, responding police officers search for persons involved in shooting and make an arrest, but may not declare scene to be secure for a while due to contrasting suspect descriptions provided by witnesses (More, 1970). In most other cases, it is common to find reports that are not correct and which claim the shooters is located at a given point (Stinchcombe & Ordaz, 2007). Tis kinds of incidences require the police to conduct thorough search within scene of crime prior to declaring it safe. Where such an attack occurs within an outsized building, search efforts will take hours before completion. Unfortunately, victims of shooting who may be injured and possibly bleeding may succumb to their injuries due to delay medical attention (More, 1970).
As a remedy to such challenges, most large cities have embarked on integrating fire department and law enforcement. Combined effort from these two bodies highlights a critical model that is challenging and undermining firefighters’ public roles as guardians of safety in the public domain (Stinchcombe & Ordaz, 2007).
Practical Applications of DPS and Cross Training
Sunnyvale DPS
An example of an organization that has successfully undertaken complete integration is California’s Sunnyvale public safety department. Although prior attempts to initiate integration failed, researcher have found that taking a simpler approach to integration such simply cross training emergency respondents is effective (Stinchcombe & Ordaz, 2007). DPS in Sunnyvale was established in the year 1950 which saw merging of fire department and law enforcement. Establishment of this initiative brought about substantial benefits to the city of Sunnyvale. For example, the city experience up to 25% in savings in terms of personnel as well as equipment acquisition and maintenance costs which included shorter working hours coupled with better salaries for its trained workers (Stinchcombe & Ordaz, 2007). In addition, other areas in which savings were made include having a joint headquarters, enhanced efficiency brought about by having a single administrative body, removal of irrelevant competition and better pooling of resource in the event of an emergency. Although a number of police departments globally have between 3 and 4 firemen working with one rig for any given station, Sunnyvale’s approach requires only 2 PSOs (Stinchcombe & Ordaz, 2007). During callouts, patrol police officers are assigned to the two firemen when there is a call out. In addition, when a medical emergency is arises, Sunnyvale dispatches a single police officer with EMS knowledge together with equipment, which includes defibrillators. Since the inception of DPS and cross training, officers have made a number of saves attributed to proper treatment and response before arrival of paramedics (More, 1970). One other case that highlights importance of DPS within the city of Sunnyvale is shooting which occurred within work environment based in a different jurisdiction. Afterwards, the perpetrator crossed over to Sunnyvale (More, 1970). Ensuing search for perpetrator needed a great number of officers beyond what was a lot for patrol during that particular day. There were only 16 officers on patrol on that day. After the day’s fire shift, POSs working under fire department shifte...