The National Law Enforcement Memorial and Museum’s Destination Zero website is a repository of 250 of the most, innovative, and successful officer safety and wellness programs from across the country. These award-winning initiatives demonstrate how all law enforcement agencies, including small departments and those with limited budgets can excel in officer safety and wellness. The Destination Zero program is made possible by the generous support of Verizon.
Here is a Top 10 list of affordable and easy to implement strategies that help maximize officer safety at minimal agency expense. For more information on these and other successful programs, visit the Destination Zero website – DestinationZero.org.
Top Ten EZ Tips from DZ
- Provide your patrol officers with a shoulder magnet light and emergency strobe to make the good guys readily visible in darkness. The light feature also keeps your hands free for greater safety.
- Provide radio earpieces to all of your patrol officers. This allows them to hear warrant returns without alerting a suspect they have stopped. It also reduces missed transmissions and missed calls for service.
- Reverse the seatbelt connection in all transports, so that the connecting metal is on the outside of the seated arrestee. This prevents officers from having to reach over a suspect to connect the seatbelt.
- Install magnetic in-car microphone mounts. This allows officers to keep their eyes on the road and not try and re-seat the mic. The magnet will grab it out of the officer’s hand.
- Provide officers the “Daily Seven.” These exercises are designed to limber you up and prepare you for patrol duties.
- Install small, yet bright, magnetic or adhesive reflectors on the inside of the driver’s side and passenger side of every patrol vehicle. This will provide greater visibility and let drivers see the open door at night or in low-light conditions.
- Provide the “Back Brochure” to all officers and allow them to properly set their driver’s seat to help avoid lower back problems.
- Use cost effective, smart phone Wellness Apps. Most contain fitness programs as well as resources for mental health and other important services for officers and their families.
- Provide every officer with a “Tactical Lunch Bag” to help them make better nutritional choices.
- Play Dispatcher Bingo, an incentive game to ease the burden of the constant stress caused by non-emergency calls that are sometime absurd. A dispatcher who gets five matching common 911 nuisance calls in a row receives a prize such as a gift card or trinket.
Don’t Miss the 2020 Destination Zero Officer Safety and Wellness Virtual Conference!
Join the National Law Enforcement and Museum’s 2020 Destination Zero Officer Safety and Wellness Virtual Conference on November 10, 2020. This all-day conference features special guests and Destination Zero award winners, a panel discussion and a not-to-be-missed abundance of safety and wellness training on everything from traffic safety to physical and mental health. For details, visit the Destination Zero website – DestinationZero.org.