More Michigan communities are adopting policies to improve police-community relations, and local officials see increased trust among residents for law enforcement officers where certain practices were in place.
The latest Michigan Public Policy Survey, conducted by the University of Michigan's Center for Local, State, and Urban Policy, finds two policies in particular may be associated with that increased trust: community policing and law enforcement training in de-escalation and bias awareness.
Statewide, 84% of local officials strongly or somewhat agree most of their residents trust police in their community, but the number rises to 95% where those practices have been adopted.
"While we cannot say for certain that (these policies) cause higher public trust, the relationship holds even when controlling for a variety of jurisdiction characteristics such as population size, demographic composition and region," the researchers wrote in the survey.
The findings reveal big jumps in adopting several practices associated with police-community relations between 2015 and 2024. Across Michigan, the reported use of de-escalation techniques, cultural understanding and bias awareness has more than doubled from about a quarter of jurisdictions to more than half.
Similarly, the reported use of policies mandating independent investigations into officer-involved injuries or deaths has more than doubled.
"Many local officials statewide told us back in 2015 that their communities were likely to enact some of these types of policing policies, and the 2024 survey shows that they followed through," said Debra Horner, the survey's senior program manager.
However, the survey finds substantially less movement by law enforcement agencies to make policing policies available for public review, such as online, or to create civilian oversight boards to advise police. The proportion of jurisdictions reporting they either already have or are likely to adopt such policies has declined in the past decade.
The research notes gaps in attitudes between local officials and law enforcement leaders-the latter have much more favorable opinions about police-community relations. Also, jurisdictions with higher proportions of Black residents generally have lower assessments of that relationship.
"What stood out to me was just how differently local officials, police and prosecutors see things," said Micaja Verna, student policy analyst at the Center for Local, State, and Urban Policy. "Police leaders are a lot more optimistic, but prosecutors and local officials aren't always seeing the same picture. That tells us there's still work to do to rebuild trust and make sure reform efforts reflect what communities actually experience."
CLOSUP, which is part of U-M's Ford School of Public Policy, received survey responses in April-June 2024 from county, city, township and village officials from 1,307 jurisdictions across the state. It also garnered responses from 54 county sheriffs, 234 chiefs of police or directors of public safety and 55 elected county prosecutors-a 58% response rate.
The latest wave of the survey program was funded by a grant from the Joyce Foundation.
