Markeshia Ricks Photo
Police Commission chair Tony Dawson, Esserman, and Harp at Thursday’s announcement.
City cops will get more help acquiring needed resources and addressing quality-of-life issues thanks to one of the newest not-for-profits in town: the New Haven Police Foundation.
Mayor Toni Harp, Police Chief Dean Esserman and former Board of Police Commissioner Richard Epstein gathered on the third floor of 1 Union Ave. Thursday to announce the new foundation, which Epstein said has been about two years in the making.
Epstein (pictured) said the foundation, which is independent of the police department, has as its mission helping the police department improve public safety by raising money for “critical services that are not funded by the budget.”
Harp said the foundation will help the police department further its public safety goals and outreach programs for children such as the the Police Activities League (PAL) and the Youth & Police Initiative, which pairs young people with their neighborhood police officers to work on building positive relationships.
The New Haven Police Foundation will be looking to citizens, businesses and other charitable organizations to help the department do even more than they can with limited city resources. (Read more about the foundation here.)
Esserman said New Haven’s foundation is joining more than 100 such foundations that already exist in the country. He said while the foundation will be raising money that will help the department with resources for equipment and some specialized training for officers, the majority of its efforts will be aimed at helping the department sustain and even expand its programs aimed a the city’s youth.
“This is for the families and children of New Haven,” Esserman said. “This is about them, not about us.”