"People are open to come up and talk to you than inside a police car," said Albany Police Officer Nicholas Carpenter.

Carpenter had been patrolling Albany's South End for five and a half years. He said an opportunity came up for a bit of a change and he wanted to take advantage.

Now Carpenter spends part of his shift in that same area, but now on a bicycle instead of in a car.  

"Best part about being on a bike is you get to exercise while at work, you get to be out, you get to meet new people all the time. Like I said, it's the perfect way to patrol," said Carpenter.

It's definitely a unique way to patrol certain areas. While we were riding around a lot of people didn't see us until we were almost on top of them. That has its positives and negatives.

The first place we stopped was a convenient store in the South End Nick visits often. He goes in and grabs a water or something to drink, but the real reason he goes in is to check on the owners and workers.  

Nick has come to know the family well and has gone out of his way to make them know he's around no matter what they need.

"If they ever need anything, I gave them my personal number, they can give me a call and they actually do. This is just one of the many stores that I do stop into," said Carpenter.

We headed back out on the streets. We were riding along and something caught Nick's eye and so he pulled over. One of the residents was having a yard sale out in front. The whole point of the Neighborhood Engagement Unit is to engage on a different level.  

There is obviously tension across the country between police and the communities they serve. The home owner was having a conversation with Nick and a woman was sitting on her stoop. What he said was something Nick truly appreciated.  

"I don't have a problem with the police. They protect. They protect. You're not supposed to have a problem with the police because if something goes wrong the first thing you do is dial 911," the home owner said as he gestured dialing a phone.  

Nick thanked the man, we stayed a little longer and then went back out of the road.

As we rode, Nick pointed out some different things, hangouts, abandoned homes and even some spots of recent violence.  

Albany is going through a rough summer. We spoke about a day last week where Nick says he was in the community with a local pastor talking with people.

"We were doing meet and greets, it was really awesome. People were coming up to us. We had a lot of good conversations, 7 o'clock rolls around and from 7 o'clock until I think 11 o'clock there were five shootings and four people shot. It's tough," said Nick.

Nick became a police officer because he wanted to make a different and help people and it's truly in his blood: His father and grandfather were both police officers.  

Nick says he knew as far back as he can remember that he wanted to be a cop and when he told his father he wasn't shocked.

"I think he knew for a while I wanted to be a police officer because that's all I would talk about. He'd bring me to the station when I was younger and he'd throw me in the car and I would just love it," Nick recalled.

Six years on the force for this Catholic High graduate and he says there's nothing he'd rather being doing than serving the people of Albany.