Tulsa Police Continue Outreach To Hispanic Community

Larry Edwards tapes a Spanish-language poster on a business window near 21st Street and Garnett Road on Tuesday. The posters are part of a larger outreach effort to inprove the Tulsa Police Department's relationship with the city's Hispanic community. MATT BARNARD/Tulsa World

Long-term efforts to bolster relations between Latinos and the Tulsa Police Department continued Thursday as officers went door-to-door with posters designed to dispel unease and myths about law enforcement.

Crimes such as domestic abuse and robbery tend to go unreported among Hispanics because of their fears of police, Officer Jesse Guardiola said. The wariness stems in part from their knowledge of police agencies in Latin America that are often seen as corrupt or unreliable.

Guardiola said that like any other ethnic group, Tulsa's estimated 60,000 Hispanics are generally "God-fearing, law-abiding people" who don't want criminals in their neighborhoods. By handing out the movie posters at a shopping center at the intersection of 21st Street and Garnett Road - an area with a high Hispanic population - administrators hope that Latinos will learn that police mean well and want to help.

Passersby, many of whom were Latin American, peered at the posters after shopkeepers hung them in their store windows. The message "The Tulsa Police Department is NOT Immigration and Customs Enforcement" is written in Spanish atop each of the 200 glossy prints, which also include tips on how to avoid becoming a victim of crime.

The Tulsa Police Department started outreach efforts to the Hispanic community last July under former Chief Ron Palmer. Since then, Interim Chief Chuck Jordan has moved into the department's top spot.

Jordan said it is important to carry the program through the administrative switch and that he intends to continue the effort.

"I was very relieved
to find out we were already making inroads," he said. "We need to have people trusting the police and know that we will do the same job for them that we do for the rest of the community."

Guardiola said that "if we lose that, then what you're going to have is a larger growth in crime, whether that be the drug crimes or you have the gang-recruitment issue.

"If don't have a voice," he said, "then we lose that rapport, and we all suffer."

March 12, 2010