Culture and data top priorities for Hamilton police first CAO
Anna Filice has big plans as the Hamilton Police Service’s new chief administrative officer, from tackling culture, to overseeing the advancements in digital evidence and data analysis.
Filice is a Hamilton native who built the foundation of her career working in human resources. She left her job as director of HR systems and operations at the City of Hamilton for the new job in April.
Her role is one of many firsts: the first CAO for Hamilton police and one of the first women in a such a senior position in the service (Christine Silverberg served as deputy chief from 1992-1995).
As CAO, Filice is the third leader in a management team that also includes two deputy chiefs — all three report directly to the police chief. She oversees about 200 sworn and civilian staff in finance, human resources, computer services, records, fleet and facilities.
Sitting in her office at central station, Filice admits she’s been asked the question about her welcome as a woman and civilian more than once.
“I can tell you quite seriously they’ve never made me feel that way,” she said, referring to the notion that policing has been “an old boys’ club.”
The truly bold move was civilianizing the role, she says. CAOs are uncommon in policing, and even rarer is to make that role part of the leadership team.
“I think it’s a bit more progressive,” she said.
At the swearing-in ceremony where the public was introduced to Filice and new Deputy Chief Frank Bergen in April, her son Michael sat in the front. When Chief Eric Girt came over to say hello, her son stood, took off his gloves (it was a bitterly cold day and they were outside) and held out his hand to shake the chief ’s hand.
“The proudest mommy moment,” she said, latter adding her young son thinks it’s pretty cool his mom works for the police. “Michael is my priority ... I said that to the board in my first interview,” she said. But “I’m (also) dedicated, hardworking, will always get the job done.”
Also on her mind that cold day in April was her dad, who died three years ago. He immigrated to Hamilton from southern Italy when he was 12 years old, and proudly worked for the city’s culture and recreation department fixing play structures in parks and driving the Zamboni in arenas.
“I think he would have just been super happy about this,” she said of getting the police job.
Indeed, he was ecstatic when she was hired by the city — a job that included managing the benefit portfolio and overseeing the rollout of a large engagement survey.
There, Filice says, she counted former city manager Chris Murray as one of her mentors; she was both sad and not surprised to see him hired for the top job in Toronto, where he starts later this month.
Now one of the big books that sits on her desk is the Police Services Act — legislation she’s never had to deal with before. But slowly she’s been learning more about policing, including attending every morning “parade” meeting and doing a ridealong with the service’s social navigator officer.
“My main objective in the first few months has really been to listen, observe and learn,” Filice said, later adding she’s avoiding making any non-essential hires as she tries to get her mind around the budget. “I’m still in learning mode. I don’t want to shoot from the hip.”
One of her big focuses will be culture as her role heading HR.
“We have some real challenges with succession planning,” she said.
This includes a lot staff retiring or taking leaves that can make meeting staffing minimums a challenge. New officers can only be hired after someone has left and police cannot be hired temporarily.
A recent Hamilton police internal survey taken shortly before Filice began found that only about 15 per cent of officers believe there are enough employees to staff a unit or shift.
“If we don’t do anything about it, we probably shouldn’t have asked,” she said.
What Filice doesn’t want is people getting burnt out. So she’s going to be looking for trends and talking with front-line staff.
“Do I have a solution yet? No, but I’m always confident there is a way.”
The other big piece she’s looking at is data. There has been a huge increase in digital evidence from cellphone cameras and surveillance video. And this all needs to be gathered, analyzed, stored and often shared with court. The police service is looking at a data warehouse.
The other side of data is analytics — not just using data for crime analysis, but analysis of internal issues too, she said. For instance, HR analytics could help find trends and manage absenteeism.
Filice doesn’t oversee front-line officers, but looks at her job as supporting that work. For instance, Hamilton police are working to equip front-line officers with Narcan — the opioid overdose antidote. Filice’s team will help order the pouches the nasal spray is held in and track expiration dates.
“That’s our role, enabling and supportive.”