99% Invisible - 216- The Blazer Experiment

Episode Date: June 15, 2016

In 1968, the police department in Menlo Park, California hired a new police chief. His name was Victor Cizanckas and his main goal was to reform the department, which had a strained relationship with the community at the time. Cizanckas … Continue reading →

This is 99% invisible. I'm Roman Mars. In 1968, the police department in Menlo Park, California hired a new police chief. His name was Victor Sazankas. And Chief Sazankas' main goal was to reform the police department's image, which wasn't great at the time. That's our own Delaney Hall. Because this was the 1960s, and even in Menlo Park, a small city with manicured lawns and wide suburban streets, it had been a turbulent decade. There were big student-led anti-war demonstrations at Stanford University, which he was right

nearby. Joan Bias, the folk singer, created a commune called Struggle Mountain in the foothills above the city, and leaders in the African-American community were organizing protests to demand better treatment and services. The Menlo Park Police had clashed with these protesters, sometimes violently. And after years and years of this, the department had a pretty rough reputation. Had a reputation for being a very tough police department,

a very aggressive police department, and somewhat of a very anti-race kind of a police department. That's Dominic Paloso. He was hired in 1970 by Chief Susencus, the guy who wanted to change this culture. He's one of these type of guys that would come into a room and would just fill in the room. You know, and everybody kind of sits back and says,

I think we better listen and go along with this guy. Chief Susencus had hired Dominic right out of the Jesuit seminary where Dominic had been studying to be a priest. Susencus liked hiring officers from non-traditional law enforcement backgrounds and with higher levels of education. It was just one of his strategies for reforming the department. He also let his officers grow their hair out and have beards and mustaches. He changed all the pseudo-military titles

to more corporate ones. Sargents became managers, for example, and lieutenants became directors. Officers in the department had mixed feelings about all these changes, but one was more controversial than the others. For a long time, officers in Menlo Park had worn a variation of the traditional dark blue police uniform.

But Chief Susencus thought that style was too intimidating and aggressive. So the chief came up with something totally different. It was really nice, kind of a dark green blazer with some black thread in it. and aggressive. So the chief came up with something totally different. It was really nice, kind of a dark green blazer with some black thread in it. We wore pastel colored solid shirts with a tie and slacks. Instead of a metal badge, the blazer sported an embroidered patch that sort of looked like a coat of arms. Guns and handcuffs remained hidden under the jacket. All in all the officers look kind of like grown-up prep school students, but with guns. They even had pocket protectors

with the Menlo Park Police logo on it that would slide into the pocket of their dress shirts. It seems like the total effect is he was trying to demilitarize the look and attitude of the department. Yeah, I think that would be a correct statement. A lot of the guys we join in police departments are from the military. And because of the nature of the work, it can't be very militaristic, shall we say,

an organization and training and all those kinds of things. And he was trying to calm it down. But Chief Susancus was also messing with a tradition that would prove extremely hard to change. Because the blue military style uniform had a history that went back more than 100 years. What we've asked police officers to wear over the years says a lot about what we've expected of them and how we feel about them. It even says a lot about how they feel about themselves. Back in America's colonial days, law enforcement looked really different than it does now.

In New England, there were these informal groups, generally known as the watch, that patrolled neighborhoods looking for crime. No uniforms, no sort of organizational policies that they had to follow is basically every able man. Chad Posec teaches in the Department of Criminal Justice and Criminology at Georgia Southern University. If they saw somebody that needed help, a fire, crime on the corner, it would just be an informal group that would sort of respond to that.

So that was in the North. In Southern communities leading up to the Civil War, there were roving patrols that were responsible for suppressing slave revolts and tracking down runaway slaves. They worked for large plantation owners. So very much in the south, early policing was tied to slavery. We're in the north that was more of policing crime

in these large urban areas. These unofficial patrols were how early law enforcement worked for decades. It wasn't until the 1820s that modern policing began to take shape. Thanks to a British statesman named Sir Robert Pio. Before Pio came along, policing in London looked a lot like it did in colonial America. Informal and loosely organized.

And Pio recognized that there were problems with this model. People not taking it seriously, being drunk on the job, not showing up, falling asleep, and so he wanted to do is create a police department that was based on certain principles. In after years of pushing for reform, Peele succeeded. In 1829, he helped found the London Metropolitan Police, the first modern, full-time city-wide police department. British officers are still known as Bobby's, in honor of Robert Bobby Peele. In Ireland, they called them Pealers with a little less affection. Peele required his officers to wear uniforms that would distinguish them from citizens they were

meant to serve, but Peele was also sensitive to how British people might perceive this new police force. Yes, that was a huge concern. Because for so many years, the people were ruled by the military in a military state. Peele wanted the new police uniforms to stand apart from the red coats of the British military. That sort of where we forget our first blue uniform that was a very professional looking. And it was actually stood and stark contrast to the red that you saw with the military. Gradually, Peale's ideas and his blue uniform made their way to the United States. By the early 1900s, police departments across the country

had adopted aspects of the style and approach pioneered by the London Metropolitan Police. This included a quasi-military structure and the goal of crime prevention. But there were still some problems. Most early police departments in the US allied themselves with the rich and the powerful like local politicians and business leaders. And you might be thinking, it's still like that now.

And you might be right, but it was worse than. Like a new mayor would get elected and then would appoint a hand-picked police chief. Then the police chief would hire their family, their friends to become the officers of that department. So very political and obviously if you're the police chief and you sort of work for the mayor of the local politician you're going to

serve their purposes first and the community maybe secondarily. It was a patronage system and in most departments recruits didn't receive any special training. They were just handed a badge and a night stick and sent out on patrol. Despite the spiffy new uniforms and their newly organized approach, public trust in the police was dismal. So a reform movement begins to grow across America, and then in 1929 President Herbert Hoover convenes a group called the Wicker-Sham Commission to conduct the first national study of the American criminal justice system.

They look at the system from top to bottom. And they basically saw the infiltration of politics into policing as a huge problem. And they said that we need to change up how we do things. The Wicker-Sham report shocked the country by exposing widespread police abuse. It described police routinely beating suspects and holding them illegally for lengthy questioning. And you might be thinking, it's still like that now, and you might be right. But it was worse than. The report included some pretty disturbing accounts, like a suspect who was held by the

ankles from a third story window, and another who was forced to stand in the morgue with his hands on the body of a murder victim. This report, the Wickersham report, really was sort of this turning point and we need to do something different in policing and I think that's what led into this professional era. This new professional era, which continued up until the 1960s and 70s, was characterized by an emphasis on policing as a skilled profession. This old educational film called Your Police lays it out.

Police departments use modern science to protect you, such as teletype, photography, two-way radio, expert firearms training as standardized by the FBI National Academy. Accident prevention installations and other... Now police were trained to use modern tools and technology, and one of the leading voices for this new method was a guy named August Wolmer. He'd been the first police chief of Berkeley, California, and he helped to write the Wickersham report. Woolmer got his officers to use motorcycles and patrol cars instead of just walking around.

That way they could cover bigger areas more efficiently. He was also one of the first chiefs in the US to insist his department used fingerprinting and blood and fiber analysis to help solve crimes. And under his influence, California became a hotbed of police reform from the 1920s through the 1960s, leading, of course, to stuff like chiefs, Hizankus' Blazer uniform experiment in Menlo Park. For a few years, it seemed like chiefs, Hizencus' reforms might be working. In Blazers and ties and pocket protectors, the Menlo Park police definitely looked less

intimidating. Here's Dominic Poloso again. He eventually became assistant chief under Susencus. It wasn't like we slacked off and became like oh mercy and forgiveness and love and peace and all that kind of stuff. You know, oh no, but the way we did it and the style that we gave to people, I think, made them feel a lot better about us. And he built up a lot of really good rapport with the community. There was even an early study suggesting that altercations between citizens and the police had declined because of the blazers.

The study was later challenged, but when it first came out, word began to spread and a few other departments across the country adopted the blazer style. But the uniform experiment also drew a line within the department. On one side, there were the guys like Dominic, who liked what the blazer stood for. They embraced that Chief Susenka's wanted the department to have a calmer, more professional image. There's a lot of guys who want to do this job, but don't want to go out there and knock heads or shoot people or you know whatever like that. They just want to do the best for the community. And I think with our uniform, people who are applying got more the sense that we really

work community-minded helping people. On the other side were the old school police officers who missed the traditional uniform and all that it represented. They enjoyed the ego stuff that goes with it. They also enjoy that sense of authority that you show, the clearness of who they are. With the blazer, it just wasn't always that clear. You know, I'd stop a person, I'd say, for violation. And I'd walk up and say, can I see your license? You know, when they look at you, they say, well, let's see your license.

You know, who are you? Then you point to the little patch and say, well, I'm the police, you know. This is retired sergeant Van Trask. He worked under Sazankas and generally he liked the chief's style and approach, but he admits that it caused some complications. You didn't have that much recognition as a cop, so you kind of... There's a tendency to get more, who are you? You know, I'm the police, you know, I'm sure you are.

Many officers got so frustrated that they quit. The numbers we've heard on this vary. Van said about half the department left. Dominic thinks it was even higher. I would guess that in his first four years as police chief, we had about a 75% turnover. People just left and went to other departments. But I think they just couldn't take his overall thinking, out of the box thinking, his philosophy and stuff,

so they all just abandoned. And eventually, Siz the box thinking, his philosophy and stuff, so they all just abandon. And eventually, Sizankus left, too, to take over as the chief of a police department in Stamford, Connecticut. You know, there's some talk that he was actually kind of encouraged to leave. And not long after he left, the department switched back to the traditional uniform style. Sizankus passed away in 1980. The year that Cezanquez joined the Menlo Park Police Department, 1968, represented an important turning point for law enforcement in the U.S.

The community policing approach championed by Cezanquez would continue to gain traction through the 80s and 90s, as departments across the country tried to build better, less combative relationships with their local communities. But there had always been attention between the more community oriented side of policing and the more military side, and that was about to intensify.

In recent years, crime in this country has grown nine times as fast as population. At the current rate, the crimes of violence in America will double by 1972. We cannot accept that kind of future for America. In 1968, Richard Nixon ran for president on a promise of law and order. He tapped into all the paranoia and unease that had grown during the turmoil of the 1960s. His campaign ads were full of these scary images of urban unrest and rioting, and they ended with his slogan written across the screen. Vote like your whole world

depended on it. I pledge to you, the wave of crime is not going to be the wave of the future in America. Shortly after taking office, Nixon vowed to fight the war on crime, which had been started by his predecessor, Lyndon Johnson. He also declared a war on drugs. Again, criminal justice professor, Chad Posick. One I think the language is very important, right? You don't have, say, drug prevention or a crime prevention.

It's the war, war on drugs, the war on crime. So you do see an escalation during this time on how crime is responded to, and it's responded to, like they're responding to war. War of course requires specialized equipment, And around this same time, the government established the law enforcement assistance administration, a now-defunct federal agency that gave lots of money to local police departments so they could buy new fangled crime fighting tools. You see this uptick and support for all sorts of policing, but especially riot gear and SWAT teams and armored vehicles and weapons and bulletproof fast and those types of things.

Even small rural departments were getting their hands on stuff like helicopters and serious crowd control gear like shields and helmets. And new paramilitary divisions of the police, like SWAT teams, began using this gear. Some exchanged the traditional blue uniform for camouflage outfits, known as the Battle Dress Uniform. They began to look more military. As this kind of equipment and style spread, so did more militarized policing tactics. Conducting raids, crackdowns, and harshly enforcing laws,

and they're behind the mask that they wear in riot gear, or the big, huge vests that they wear in the SWAT team. This trend continued to the 80s and 90s in lots of police departments across the country. It accelerated in many places after 9-11, as police departments became closer with federal law enforcement agencies and started thinking of themselves as part of the first line of defense in a new war, the war on terror. New federal programs emerged

that sent surplus military equipment from Iraq and Afghanistan to local police departments across the country. Which brings us to today. The police just arrested someone. They're basically confronting the police. They all get them over this arrest. Back off, please. Across the country there have been highly publicized protests against police shootings of unarmed black men, women and even children. And these protests have sparked bigger conversations about police violence and also how our police

look. For several nights this week, this was Ferguson, Missouri. Tanks, combat gear, assault rifles. It looked like a military operation. The current mistrust of police seems to mirror what was going on in Menlo Park back in 1968, pre-blazer, but on a more dramatic scale. Back in the 1960s, it was big conversations about the role of police and the community that led Chief Sizankas to make changes to the Menlo Park Unals. The current mistrust of police seems to mirror what was going on in Menlo Park back in 1968, pre-blazer, but on a more dramatic scale. Back in the 1960s, it was big conversations about the role of police and the community that led Chief Sizankas to make changes to the Menlo Park Unals. Back in the 1960s, it was big conversations about the role of police and the community

that led Chief Sizankas to make changes to the Menlo Park uniform. Today, at least so far, no departments have taken steps that drastic, but in Minneapolis, they're taking a small step in that general direction. Manyapolis SWAT teams will soon unveil a new look to make them a peer less intimidating. In February of 2016, the Minneapolis Police Department changed the color of their SWAT uniforms, from a military green to a more traditional navy blue. This happened about four months after the city saw widespread protests. After the police shot and killed an unarmed black man named Jamar Clark.

The Minneapolis Police Department declined to talk with us about the uniform change, but they made it clear in other interviews that this color change is about public perception and rebranding. We are police, we are not military, we don't train with the military, we're not associated with the military, we're the Minneapolis Police Department, and we want to be reflective of our own community, and our own image. What's not totally clear is if the color of the uniform actually matters. I mean, they can wear pink, but if they're coating guns

and rubber bullets and mace and tasers and everything else. This is Candice Montgomery. She's an activist with Black Lives Matter, and she's taken part in protests in Minneapolis against the police. A color's not gonna change that dynamic, an entire overhaul of the policing system, it's gonna change that dynamic and people's responses.

Of course, the problems police are facing today can't be solved by uniform change alone, but a changing uniform can be an important symbol, a way for police departments to signal to their communities that they want to have a better relationship. In the case of Chief Susancus in Menlo Park, the uniform experiment did help lead to bigger changes. Requiring officers to wear blazers meant a certain kind of officer was drawn to the police department, the kind who was willing to get on board with the more significant reforms

that Zizenka's wanted to make. And even though the department eventually abandoned the blazers, many of the other changes stuck. Here's former Menlo Park assistant chief Dominic Paloso again. Here's former Menlo Park assistant chief Dominic Paloso again. Vic was definitely ahead of his time. And, you know, as with most people who are ahead of their time, you don't have a crowd of people that all kind of stand up and cheer for you. But it would be very interesting because within, I'd say, 10 or 15 years, almost every police department in our area. Even though they didn't change the uniform or the titles of the organizational chart,

we're taking on that real big kind of community policing thing. They went ahead and did it because that was the signs of the times. 99% invisible was produced this week byaney Hall, with Katie Mingle, Sam Greenspan, Sri Fusev, Kurt Colstead, Avery Trouffleman, and me Roman Mars. Special thanks this week to Darryl Lindsay of the Menlo Park Police Department, Richard Johnson, Robert Mauro, David Cooper, and Tom DuPont. We are a project of 91.7K ALW in San Francisco and produced out of the offices of Arxon, an architecture and interiors firm in beautiful downtown Oakland, California.

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