Community Public Relations, the Police and the Media

Douglas Hyde

On Friday, a terse email from the Police Press Officer announced to the media that all requests for information or interviews from senior officers would have to be channelled through a new Public Relations Unit. That new policy, not surprisingly, didn’t find favour in the media. So today there was a formal, though informal introduction of the new Public Relations Unit, comprised of Coordinator Douglas Hyde, Corporal Hortence Hernandez and Press Officer Raphael Martinez. The introduction was done by Officer Commanding Eastern Division Dezerie Phillips and Deputy Commander Edward Broaster, and we say it was informal because the hour-long input, slash discussion session, was off the record. We’d say it was a success, with media and Police concerns aired and noted. So with that, there is a cautious acceptance of the new policy, front-lined by the new Information Management arm of the Eastern Division.

Douglas Hyde, Public Relations Coordinator, Eastern Division

“Manage all media and public queries about the operations of the Eastern division, to act as the media liaison of Eastern Division…the CPR Unit undertakes a range of media relations activities to generate positive publicity and to maintain good rapport between the members of the media. We want to coordinate and disseminate information monthly, or daily, in terms of our newsletter, our magazine which is to promote the work of Police Officers, our programs and activities at the Eastern Division? This initiative as you know is part of the whole concept for building better relationships. We’ve realized that our programs and our activities working closely with the community are some things we want to highlight on a daily and weekly basis, which we barely do. We barely talk about the successes of the Police Department working with the community and with women and children on a whole. So yes, this move is definitely a proactive move to highlight more of our success stories and of course to highlight our Police officers who work on a daily basis when it comes to mediation and conflict resolution and also working closely in the schools with our GREAT Program and Youth Cadet Program and other sixteen community policing programs.”