Cherry the cat, with her green eyes and purple flowered crown, often poses for photos with her owner, Bloomington resident Nadine Sanders.
Cherry was presented with a new crown Wednesday — the title of “cutest pet” by the Bloomington Police Department after her photo garnered 73 likes on Facebook.
Steve Kellams, BPD public information officer, said social media contests are just one arm of the department’s community outreach program.
While the BPD has in-person events, including monthly Coffee with a Cop, the Citizen’s Police Academy and Teen Academy, online outreach has become essential.
“It may not seem like anything unusual,” Kellams said. “But I challenge you to find another police department doing as much as us, especially with such limited resources and manpower.”
Sanders said what the BPD is doing is unusual and sets them apart as a police department committed to connecting with the residents it serves.
"I really do appreciate how the BPD is trying to reach out to the community here," she said in a Facebook message. "I think more departments over the U.S. should do the same."
The BPD started out its social media campaigns with Fur-Ever Friend Fridays, during which police officers posted pictures of themselves posing with animals, including dogs, cats, rabbits and rats from Bloomington Animal Care and Control.
Now, it has expanded its posts. Examples include those that commemorate fallen officers and a recent one of open-mouthed officers pointing at Monday's solar eclipse. Officers also post road closings, requests for crime tips, news releases and BPD job listings.
Last year, the BPD’s Facebook page had only 4,000 likes. Now, it has 17,000, as well as more than 2,100 followers on Twitter and 328 followers on Instagram. Kellams said community partnerships have fostered the growth and helped contribute to other organizations. He said its regular posts have helped animals get adopted from the shelter.
These partnerships are a necessity because the 150 full-time BPD employees aren’t enough to fix an entire community, Kellams said.
“A hundred-and-fifty people can’t do it,” he said. “I can’t do it. We need to work together.”
Recent problems with a lack of trust in police in the U.S. have made it critical that police aren’t seen as separate from their communities, Kellams said. That way, people can be more comfortable coming to police officers with their problems.
Kellams said there was a time when all this was easier. Officers worked specific beats and focused on small areas, patrolling them and getting to know their people on a personal level. Now, officers ride in cars. There are also fewer officers covering larger areas, making individual connections more difficult.
As a result, social media has become a means of maintaining that connection and returning to traditional outreach, but on a larger scale for a larger community.
Kellams said police officers often arrive on the scene during dark times in people’s lives. This means people often connect police officers to bad experiences, which can keep them from seeing police officers as an arm of public safety. He said efforts like the cutest pet contest break down this negative connection and help separate police officers from difficult times.
“We see people at the worst times in their lives, not when they’re happy,” he said “So whenever we get the chance to do something not connected to crime, it’s a lot of fun.”
Not only does using social media campaigns to connect with the community help residents, but it also helps cops show a more human side. Seeing officers smiling with animals, eating chicken sandwiches from BuffaLouie’s and laughing together all work to humanize cops, Kellams said.
“Sometimes people don’t recognize you out of uniform because they don’t see you as a person,” he said. “A uniform is all they are to you, but when they connect with you and see you in normal situations, all of a sudden, you’re not just a uniform anymore.”
