New Haven Register (New Haven, CT)
Documents break down calls to Yale police
NEW HAVEN — The Yale Police Department’s patrol division logged an average of about 17,400 calls for service annually between 2015 and 2018, with welfare checks, motor vehicle stops, alarms and treasury pickups together comprising more than 70 percent of total calls, documents show.
The organization Black Students for Disarmament at Yale, which is calling for the department to be disbanded, contends the data strengthens its case for disarmament and reinvestment of funds spent on the agency. But Yale police Chief Ronnell Higgins emphasized that the call logs do not reflect all YPD services and noted the value of the department in promoting campus safety.
“The Yale Police Department remains committed to enhancing its policies as best practices evolve, to serving all members of our community, and to treating everyone with respect and dignity,” Higgins said in a statement.
The YPD consists of 93 officers, of which 65 are uniformed patrol officers, according to a 2020 assessment of the YPD, commissioned by the university and carried out by a group of consultants known as 21CP Solutions.
“Highly trained officers familiar with the campus, campus culture and the expectations of both the New Haven and Yale communities are vitally important, particularly when we have seen how quickly violent incidents, including bombings, violent crimes and mass shootings, take place on college campuses throughout the country,” Higgins said in his statement.
New Haven police Chief Otoniel Reyes also said last month that Yale’s force represents a huge city resource, lessening the burden on taxpayers by handling thousands of calls each year.
But BSDY research and policy director Teigist Taye contended that most of the services reflected in the call log, such as welfare checks, did not appear to require an armed response.
Taye and other BSDY members say the money that goes toward the department should be reinvested in the New Haven community, and a petition with those demands has more than 8,000 signatures, according to change.org, the website where it is posted.
The YPD records, shared with Hearst Connecticut Media and published online by BSDY, also outline how much the university spends on public safety each year and include the YPD’s 2019 use of force report, which previously had been available on the university’s website.
Calls for service
Between 2015 and 2018, annual calls for service logged by the YPD’s patrol division were lowest in 2016, when they reached around 16,300, and highest in 2017, when they hit approximately 18,500, the YPD records show.
The data includes “self-initiated” calls, Higgins said.
A self-initiated call occurs when Yale patrol officers call in the activity themselves, according to the 21CP report.
Door and/or welfare checks represented the most common service type, with YPD recording at least 5,000 each year and more than 7,000 in 2016, according to Yale’s data.
(The 21CP report indicates that between the start of 2014 and Oct. 2019, YPD officers were dispatched just over 81,600 times. Higgins was unsure of the reasons behind any discrepancies between that figure and the data recently released by Yale, he said, but added that it may be a matter of nomenclature.)
Second in frequency were treasury pickups, which ranged from 2,865 in 2015 to 3,775 in 2018, the data shows.
A treasury pickup “entails a police officer providing money escort services to those university departments that handle revenue as part of their business operations,” Higgins said.
Higgins emphasized that the call log does not reflect all of the YPD’s work.
“The calls that YPD receives, much like any department, represent one metric,” he said.
The log does not, for example, represent the department’s investigative work or include follow-up visits, he said.
“YPD provides crime prevention, law enforcement, assistance to victims of crime, addresses public order maintenance and provides emergency response,” Higgins said later, in a statement. “Yale places a priority on the safety and security of all members of the community, including over 20,000 students, faculty, staff, and many more campus visitors.”
At more than 1,000 each year, police response to alarms marked the next most common call type, with two related call codes, according to the data, which marks one as “activated fire alarm” and the other as “alarm.”
Generally, motor vehicle stops were the fourth most common incident type, numbering more than 1,000 in 2015, 2017 and 2018. In 2016, however, there were fewer than 600 motor vehicle stops, per the records.
The debate
For Taye, the number of calls dedicated to welfare checks and treasury pickups strengthened her sense that Yale does not need a large, armed police force, she said.
In August, Taye told a reporter she was looking for an answer on why Yale officers needed to be armed 24/7.
“I’m still not getting a satisfying answer,” she said Monday.
Taye said welfare checks especially should be conducted by individuals who are unarmed, she said.
But Higgins said officers must be prepared to respond to emergency situations.
“Our officers who are allowed to carry firearms must regularly complete intensive training centered around multicultural awareness, recognizing mental illness, and de-escalation techniques,” he said. “The tragedies, including mass shootings, that have occurred on other campuses in past years remind us that YPD officers must be fully prepared to respond in a timely fashion to any life-threatening emergency situation that might arise on campus. “
The budget
Yale’s Public Safety department, which includes police and security services, had $44 million worth of expenses budgeted for the 2020 fiscal year, offset by $9 million in “internal revenue,” according to the university records.
Most of the public safety spending – just under $37 million – was allotted for salaries and benefits, per the budget breakdown.
Yale did not respond to a request for information on how much of that spending was dedicated only to the YPD.
Steven Woznyk, a YPD assistant chief, defined “internal revenue” in an email sent to BSDY members and later shared with Hearst Connecticut Media.
“Internal revenue represents (revenue) monies billed and collected for services rendered. An example of this would be public safety hired for special events,” Woznyk said in the email.
Overall, Yale’s public safety expenses have increased since the 2016 fiscal year, when expenses were at approximately $32 million, according to the records.
During that time, internal revenue has more than doubled, the document shows.
Use of force
YPD recorded 26 incidents involving use of force last year, according to the department’s annual report.
Any use of force greater than unresisted handcuffing is included in the report, Higgins said.
Of the 26 use-of-force incidents — which represented 0.82 percent of the YPD’s interactions with the public — eight involved medical calls, according to the report, which indicates that five of those incidents involved an intoxicated person.
Isaac Yearwood, BSDY’s actions director, said he found the percentage of use-of-force incidents tied up with medical calls “distressing.”
But Higgins said a wide range of calls are classified as “medical,” such as “intoxication, under the influence of drugs, psychological evaluation, and self-harm.”
“Yale police officers seek to de-escalate situations and problem solve,” Higgins said. “They also have a duty to report any excessive use of force by an officer that they observe.”
Throughout the 26 interactions involving use of force, a total of 79 techniques were used, with handcuffing used 20 times, representing the most common, per the report.
Firearms were drawn 12 times but only discharged once, the report says.
In all, five citizens and eight officers reported suffering injuries during use-of-force incidents in 2019, according to the report.
“Use of force within the department has been infrequent,” Higgins said.