Oswego residents will see Officer Chelsea Giovo in their neighborhoods more often.

“It’s important to break down barriers and establish trust and transparency within the community,” said Giovo.

Community policing is just one way they’ll do that. The city’s common council recently approved the department’s police reform and reinvention proposal.

This comes after Governor Andrew Cuomo’s executive order to adopt a plan by April 1, or lose state funding.

“A lot of the issues we saw nationwide certainly haven’t been documented and I don’t believe happened here,” said Oswego Mayor Billy Barlow. “But that being said, there’s always room to improve, and we want to prevent those situations from ever happening here.”

Barlow says preparation is key. Under the new plan, officers will have a mandatory anti-bias, de-escalation and minimization of force training and participate in scenario-based exercises.

“Officers need to be sensitive in all areas and understand every situation that they’re in to the best of their ability and be able to react appropriately in real time,” said Barlow.

They’ll also receive extra support depending on the incident. Barlow says mental health counselors will co-respond to domestic violence and crisis intervention calls.

“Certainly, mental health counselors are trained and specialized in those sort of situations, and I think can be of assistance to the responding police officers,” said Barlow. “At the same time, a police officer still has to respond and make sure the scene is safe.”

Barlow says all officers will wear a body camera and the system will be upgraded. If there are any citizen or internal complaints, they’ll be handled properly through a new policy.

“At the end of the day, our job is to protect and serve our community and to maintain a partnership with the Oswego residents,” said Giovo. “We hope that with these changes we continue to do so.”

The plan also includes launching a new program to combat homelessness and poverty, assigning an office to coordinate with service groups, implementing “quality assurance surveys” for officers and publicizing procedures on the city’s website.  

It will be submitted to state officials for approval, but the department is not wasting any time. They’re already implementing some of the policies.