In his almost 20-year career with the Ann Arbor Police Department, Greg O'Dell, time and again, pushed for new challenges. He climbed the chain of command from patrol officer to deputy chief, worked cooperatively with the labor union, learned to run the department's polygraph machine, and became involved in the professional standards unit - an unpopular position that involves policing the police.
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NEW SHERIFF IN TOWN: Greg O'Dell, EMU's new
executive director of public safety, takes time out
from talking to students at the Student Center about
safety. O'Dell took the helm of the Department of
Public Safety Feb. 7 and is implementing a number of
safety improvements, including having officers patrol
on foot and talk to students; clarifying department
policies and adding a daily crime log to the DPS Web
site.
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"I've always liked having a challenge and doing something different," said O'Dell, the new executive director of Eastern Michigan's Department of Public Safety.
So when he found out EMU was looking for someone to lead its police department, the lure of challenge and change began to work on him.
"Six months ago, I'd never even thought about this job," said O'Dell, who officially started at EMU Feb. 7. "But, when I heard about this, I became a little intrigued. I've had a lot of variety throughout my career and this is a unique opportunity to make some changes in this organization."
Since O'Dell arrived in early February, he's pushed for a department that's both visible and transparent — encouraging officers to patrol on foot, chatting with students, clarifying important policies and adding a daily crime log to the DPS Web site.
"I'm a big believer in open and honest government, and sharing information with people," O'Dell said.
The crime log, for example, provides information about every crime that's been reported to DPS in the last 60 days. It's not yet as detailed as O'Dell would like but, in time, it will be. The Web site also has an informational video about the campus emergency phone system and, when community crime alerts go out by e-mail, they'll immediately be posted on the Web site, too.
"One of the things I got to do in Ann Arbor was talk to student groups about 'How do I get information? How do I know what's going on?' O'Dell said. "Students aren't accustomed to picking up a newspaper...I always encourage them to use the Web site."
O'Dell has been encouraging officers to get out of their cars and into campus buildings. That visible presence and the feeling of security it creates has only become more important since the shooting at Northern Illinois University Feb. 14. O'Dell, who makes a point of having lunch in the Student Center at least once a week so he can talk informally with students, said he's spent hours walking in the parking structure and in buildings around campus.
"The other day, I was walking through Pray-Harrold and Mark Jefferson with Lt. (Bob) Heighes and a couple of professors came out of their work areas to talk with us and thank us for being there," he said.
O'Dell presented updated versions of the department's use of deadly force and police pursuit policies at his first staff meeting. He also introduced a racial profiling policy, supplemented with training to clarify just what constitutes racial profiling. Making contact with a person based on a witness's description, for example, isn't profiling. Picking someone out purely because of their race clearly is, and won't be tolerated.
"There was some mention of it in past memos, but that's one of the things you want to have a formal policy on," O'Dell said. "We want to send a clear message to the officers that we're not going to operate that way."
With a stack of policies that don't appear to have been updated in several years, he hopes to be rolling out updates on a weekly basis for a while, and eventually create a system through which every policy gets reviewed every three years.
Along with the rest of the campus community, he's awaiting the results of the security study of EMU's campus. The study, conducted by an outside consulting firm, TranSystems, will examine public safety staffing, but also things outside the department's control, such as how buildings are secured.
"One thing I would ask people is that they take a look at the real numbers as far as crime," he said. "Eastern has been the focus of a lot of attention because of the homicide that took place here but, if you look at the numbers overall, we are very average. If you look at the actual statistics, you'll see we're not in a terrible situation."
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EMERGENCY STOP: Greg O'Dell,
EMU's exeuctive director of
public safety, inspects an
emergency station near Boone
Hall. |
Compared to other Mid-American Conference campuses and other campuses in Michigan, for example, EMU ranked in the lower middle of the range for robberies in 2006 — the most recent year for which statistics are available. EMU had one robbery that year.
That said, crime does happen, and O'Dell wants EMU's Department of Public Safety to be ahead of it. As he did in Ann Arbor, O'Dell plans to put a heavy focus on working with officers to analyze crime patterns and create targeted patrols that put them in the right place at the right time.
Ann Arbor Police Department Deputy Chief Greg Bazick, who worked with O'Dell as a deputy chief for five years, said O'Dell breathed new life into the department's weekly crime meetings, turning them into strategic planning sessions and following up on those plans in subsequent meetings.
"Greg turned our weekly crime meetings into true information-sharing meetings," Bazick said. "He got them going in the direction of what the crimes were and what the targets had been. And I think that's helped us to solve crime, to deter it and, in some cases, to catch people red-handed."
O'Dell is working with nearby agencies to improve cooperation and take advantage of joint training opportunities. During winter break, EMU officers and members of the Ypsilanti Police Department worked through active-shooter training — the sort of exercises that would help officers entering a building where a gunman posed a threat to others.
"I'm open to any type of training that would further the development of some of our officers," O'Dell said. "One of the things I have here is a great facility. We have lots of buildings where we can conduct training."
O'Dell said the welcome at EMU (technically a welcome back, since he finished a bachelor's degree at Eastern in 1992) has been warm beyond all expectations. After 20 years working west of Carpenter Road, he's enjoyed having his eyes reopened to all that Ypsilanti and EMU have to offer. Everyone from students to regents has greeted him warmly, he said. And while he'll be the first to tell you there's a lot of work ahead, O'Dell seems eager to get to it and happy about where this new challenge has led.
"There are a number of excellent officers in this department," he said. "We have several officers who are highly educated and many who really enjoy what they're doing. I want people to enjoy their jobs here. I want it to be a fun environment to work in and I want them to be proud to say they are an Eastern Michigan police officer. I want to make sure they're proud of the agency and of the work we're producing."
