'Work on yourself:' Racine PD training focuses on officers' emotions

RACINE, Wis. - As police departments across the country work to address social and racial equity, the chief of the Racine Police Department required his whole team go through training. Racine police are taking a unique approach to de-escalate calls for help before an officer even arrives on scene.

When the chief of the Racine Police Department ordered every officer to go through de-escalation training, they didn't think it would involve empathetic policing focused on the officer's emotions.

Linda Webb

"What we do is, we say, 'You got to work on yourself first, you as the police officer,'" said Linda Webb with Rite Academy.

Webb said the era of officers being emotionless is long gone.

"So the whole objective of our course is to first get you to address where are you, the police officer?" said Webb. "Where are you at emotionally? We want you to get into a better space before you go and address the public."

Because when emotions are left unchecked, the outcomes can be catastrophic. 

Racine Police Chief Art Howell

"We first wanted to say, 'Are our officers healthy?'" said Racine Police Chief Art Howell. "Are they, when they go out to problem solve, do they understand what they bring into the equation?"

Chief Howell said this kind of training is made possible due to adequate department finances, and as calls to "defund the police" grow, he wants others to keep this in mind.

"The kneejerk reaction to negative events across the country would be to have less police officers, but when you really look at the complexity of the problem, you don't need less officers. You need better-trained officers," said Howell. 

Getting a better police department, this chief says, starts with the right training.

"We can't defund our way out of this situation," said Howell. 

The chief said roughly 181 department employees will go through this training, which started Monday, Sept. 14, scheduled to last through the end of the week.