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Transitioning From Recognition to Accreditation
Cornelius (NC) Police Department
In March 2003, the Cornelius Police Department was the first agency in North Carolina to achieve the CALEA Recognition award. At the Commission Conference in Austin on December 4, 2004, it became the first agency in CALEA to successfully transition from Recognition to the Law Enforcement Accreditation award.
CALEA Recognition, designed in 2000 to provide a credentialing program for smaller-sized agencies as a “stepping stone” to the Law Enforcement Accreditation program, identifies 97 standards addressing life, health, and safety issues; legal and other critical requirements; and conditions that reduce major risk and high liability exposures. While an agency may remain in Recognition status indefinitely, for agencies wanting to become accredited, the benefits of starting out in Recognition are abundant. For us, being CALEA Recognized showed we were committed to improving service delivery and resource management.
The department’s decision to lend itself to the scrutiny of CALEA actually began a few years prior to our application to begin the Recognition Program. We were working to establish policies consistent with CALEA standards, but felt the organization was not ready for a full accreditation analysis. The two main factors that influenced the decision to choose the Recognition Program were budget funding and manpower. Because Recognition costs less than the Accreditation Program and no additional manpower was needed to begin, the Town of Cornelius’ Board of Commissioners wanted to take advantage of the phasing-in of such an important initiative. Existing personnel were assigned to the CALEA Team, and with their high level of enthusiasm and energy, made it possible to cover existing police services while taking on this additional activity. The Recognition Program provided an opportunity to obtain a level of compliance with accreditation standards, without excessive expense.
Once the Recognition standards were established, we continued to work on compliance with the remaining law enforcement accreditation standards. It was a natural progression for us to then enter the CALEA Accreditation Program in September 2003. Over the next year as a “B” size agency with 51 personnel, we completed the remaining compliance files and scheduled our accreditation on-site review for the end of June 2004. As a result, it was a proud achievement when, just 15 months after gaining Recognition status, the Cornelius Police Department was awarded CALEA Accreditation in Austin!
Having gone through both programs, Cornelius Police Department encourages and recommends the Recognition Program option for agencies having the final goal of Accreditation, but would like to take a more cautious approach. Maintaining the Recognition status lays the groundwork for transitioning to Accreditation. The department is certain that the advantages of the initial lower financial costs and fewer number of standards was a significant deciding point in obtaining budgetary approval, and opened the door to future accreditation. Without the opportunity to begin in Recognition, the Cornelius Police Department would likely have had to delay their entry into the process, perhaps as much as one or more years.
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Rachel G. Laurenson,
Accreditation Manager