Interview with Chief Daugherty and Officer Llano on Community Policing: The Importance of Communication and Awareness 

CommunityPolice

I met Chief Daugherty during an online meeting in regard to an incident regarding racism on campus; I had witnessed some individuals engage in a racist rant at the Campus Center and helped in the identification of who they were. During that meeting, he mentioned different resources on campus like the Rave Guardian App and Community Policing Officer Llano for reporting and seeking help with any future incidents. Officer Llano was introduced to me through Farmingdale Pride club members who met him at the beginning of the semester. He had gone around and introduced himself in a few different classes, explaining his role on campus and that he is here as a liaison for University Police. As a member of the Pride club’s eboard, we reached out to have him attend a few of our events due to concerns for members safety as a result of instances on campus where queerphobic comments had been made and LGBTQ students were made to feel uncomfortable and unsafe.

This interview came as an idea to shed light on these two officers working towards making this campus a safe and comfortable environment for everyone. I hope the information provided by both officers will help clear some misconceptions on community policing while simultaneously spreading awareness to different efforts and resources on campus for students. I will be using tone indicators throughout the transcription of the interview ( for example, /j – joking, /s – sarcastic, /srs – serious) 

Myself: As I mentioned in my email, this interview will be pitched to the student newspaper about the University Police (UPD) community policing initiative. First, I’d like to ask how long have you been at Farmingdale? 

Chief Daugherty: I’ve been here 27 and a 1/2ish years. 

Officer Llano: I’ve been here 25 years, 26 come February of 2024. 

Chief Daugherty: We are the senior statesmen of the department. /j Myself: So you’ve been here longer than everyone else? 

Chief Daugherty: I have and then there’s another officer in between us. 

Myself: And how would you say the campus has changed since you started? Go as broad, general or as specific as you’d like?

Chief Daugherty: Well, the enrollment has gone up along with the quality of the students here as the academic standards have risen. When we first started here, there were gang problems in the residence halls. Knock on wood, we don’t see that and haven’t seen that in a while in around a decade or so. Students are here to get an education and participate in a lot of clubs and activities like yourself. We’re here to make sure they can safely do so. 

Myself: And you officer Llano? 

Officer Llano: When I first arrived here, I came from a department out east. It was tremendously different. The biggest change is that RA’s and RD’s (Residence Assistants and Directors) have more power than the police at the time, but that changed. Shortly after that it was night and day. The school has grown in population and diversity in both students and staff. 

Myself: Since Covid, have there been any specific changes since then? Officer Llano: Reduction in the population a little bit. 

Chief Daugherty: Not so much in the residence halls, our population has increased in the residence halls. Dean Rampello has taken over that part of it. Residence Director Michael Nembhard works for him; they’ve both revitalized the residence hall program. One of the major changes, and this was happening a bit before covid but it’s been 

ramped up since COVID- mental health issues in students. I can’t say enough about our Campus Mental Health Services and the job that they do; they see and help so many students and are an amazing staff. 

Myself: When did the community policing initiative start? 

Chief Daugherty: Community policing has always been a part of university policing because we have a very tight community in that we aren’t sprawled out over hundreds of miles in a town or county. Our community at night is roughly 600 residence students so we are able to do residence patrols and things like that. The position Tech Sergeant Llano is in, is just a further step in being able to be a part of event planning and to be a face that students get to know. All of our officers take part in community policing, everyday they have to get out of their vehicles and do ‘two part walk and talks’. 

Myself: All officers do the ‘walk and talk’? 

Chief Daugherty and Officer Llano: Yes. /srs

Myself: And is this just with Res Life or everybody? 

Chief Daugherty: Everywhere on campus, they’ll do it in the campus center and walk to the other buildings and things like that. 

Office Llano: Just to get out of the vehicle, so that we can be more approachable and people see us. Sometimes the vehicles can be intimidating and people may not feel comfortable approaching us. We even have the bike officers that ride around which are on pause right now.   /j 

Chief Daugherty: We still have it, it’s just no one wants to ride around in the cold right now. /j 

Myself: Fair enough. /j 

Chief Daugherty: I was originally the Dorm Officer and had an office in what is now the Residence Life Office. The old office was in Hugh Hall which has since been torn down, the newer office was the coolest ever, and had its own bathroom and kitchen. 

Myself: What’s your specific title Officer Llano? 

Officer Llano: It’s Community Relations Officer, and my title is Technical Sergeant. 

Myself: Why was Officer Llano’s current position introduced since community policing has always been a part of university policing?

Chief Daugherty: Well, I sat down with the administration and said I’d like to grow the department. We were then afforded the opportunity to hire more officers to bring up our numbers. One of the things I then introduced was devoting an officer towards community policing. It’s been in the works for a couple years now but was delayed because of covid. Officer Llano got his position roughly six months ago. 

Officer Llano: Around July, we were waiting on a few things. My immediate supervisor is Inspector Keri Hauff and together we run  programs and events for community relations. You’ll see her at the event this week. (The Afro Caribbean Club Battle of the Vybz Party) 

Myself: And do you enjoy your position? 

Officer Llano: I love it. I’ve been working with the Chief for a while and he’s been supportive but we were waiting for an increase in numbers to be able to go through with it. A lot of people have been coming to us with ideas and we were happy that we’ve been able to go through with this opportunity. 

Chief: Staffing was the real delay. He was the obvious choice, the position requires a level of skill to put yourself out there and allow students to feel comfortable around you. We have a large spectrum of officers, some are shy, some can put themselves out there. They are all professionals but some have an easier time speaking to larger groups while others prefer planning and background work. 

Myself: How has campus policing improved since last year? I heard there were meetings with Student Government (SGA) in regards to the alleged over-policing of the ‘black clubs’ on campus? 

Chief Daugherty: Yes, we had a meeting with club boards, Student Government, President Nader, Dr. Jordan (VP of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusive Excellence). We agreed on having UPD be more included in the planning process of events on campus. We straightened out some misperceptions students were having in regards to police presence at events. Intimidation is never the goal, we are here to make sure events are safe and are successful. Expectations will be more standard(ized) if communication is consistent and constant- no surprises. We want club event planners to be able to approach us if someone is causing problems so we can address it. Whether you just want an officer to pop in during the event or to hangout the whole time. If it’s a large event, you’re going to have several officers. If someone is hosting an event that’s never been done before or will have a large gathering, we don’t want our presence to be a shock- that’s why we want to be more included. When you see how our officers interact at these events, we are here in case something happens- not to interfere or intimidate. 

He (Officer Llano) is going to be at the event Thursday (ACC Party) and you guys (eboard/planners) will get an opportunity to meet and speak to officers beforehand to talk about expectations. If there’s a group of guys causing a problem, you’ll know who to speak to. As long as we’re a part of the planning process, everyone knows what to expect. 

Officer Llano: And that’s to foster connections, everytime I go to someone to promote UPD events I ask about their events going on. We are always open to collaborate, see what’s going on and answer any questions you guys have. We can give insight to things like location, parking etc so people can attend the event without issue. If we have no idea an event is happening and there’s issues with parking, we don’t want to have to enforce tickets and upset everyone- which could make people not want to attend events anymore. Also just having us there as an overwatch, to prevent the ‘why are they here?

Are they spying on us?- no we’re part of the community and we want people to be aware of that. 

Chief Daugherty: And that all comes together to ensure you have successful events so you can have more. In the past, years ago, we would have problems where a fight would break out at an event and that would be it; there would be no events on campus for months after incidents like that. So if we are part of the planning, we can be proactive and be witness (to administration) that incidents weren’t the fault of the event planners but rather one knucklehead and we took care of it.That person or group would be banned from attending future events. We don’t want people to feel like we’re the anti-fun police but sometimes we have to say’ you can’t do this, you can’t do that’, for the overall safety of everyone. Because believe it or not, we love events- we love when students are having fun. The parties in Sinclair, stuff in the campus center all make for a more robust campus community. It makes this place a better campus to be rather than ‘go to class and go home’. 

Myself: Would you say after those meetings most if not all clubs or organizations on campus have a better view on campus police? Have they been reaching out proactively and including you in the process? 

Chief Daugherty: We’d like to see more.There have been instances where we set up meetings to go over details for an event planned and nobody showed up. It’s incumbent upon groups and organizers of events to cross all t’s and dot their i’s. 

Officer Llano: Say you have your own security at an event like student security, rather than having 30 officers present we can just have a few. If you see a guy causing problems, three or four of you take him outside and we’ll take it over from there. It’s better than us going in, turning on the lights and physically removing them. Everyone gets confused, asking ‘why we are there’, ‘why are we taking him away’ and ‘that’s my friend’ etc. It’s easier when the party planners say that person needs to be escorted out, do so and let us take it from there. 

Chief Daughtery: Stuff like whether people have to register ahead of time for events, are guests allowed, are people going to be wearing wristbands, how many people are expected to show up etc. All these details from before the events happen help us make things successful. Things like small guest speaker events versus events with 50 people expected, we could schedule a small meeting to go over things. 

Officer Llano: When you normally see police, people assume something’s wrong. We want to change that.

Myself: And since Officer Llano has a life, we can always reach out and make arrangements for a different officer to attend an event. 

Chief Daughtery: Yes of course, that’s what we settled on last year. We tried to have organizers reach out a couple days before an event or even an hour before to try a schedule when, where and how an officer can monitor the situation. 

Myself: The Halloween Party that happened the other day (SGA, NAACP, SHPE Spook Fest), were you contacted beforehand? 

Officer Llano: Yes we were, which was proactive planning. There was an incident last year so we wanted to make sure those involved weren’t there. Every event that I’ve been to, and I’ve seen at a lot of them, everyone has been having a good time. When everyone knows we’ll be there, we can have a safe, successful event. 

Myself: Sorry about that by the way. I’m Jamaican and the DJ played quite a bit of Caribbean music at the party and there was a song playing called ‘Run Wid It’. The lyrics are like “pick up something, anything run, run wid it, pick up something start to run wid it” and I had a folded chair. Officer Llano’s face was so concerned. 

Chief Daugherty and Officer Llano: *laughing* 

Myself: At some Caribbean parties, people will grab their short friends and run with them. 

Chief Daugherty and Officer Llano: *laughing* 

Officer Llano: Everybody was picking up stuff and running around and I didn’t know what was happening. I was like wait, “What are the lyrics? What is everybody doing?” 

Chief Daugherty: Now you know for next time. /j It’s like this song back in the day, where there was a part about macaroni and cheese. People would take Kraft mac and cheese boxes and when the part came on about it they would throw the boxes on stage. And they warned everybody but I had to duck down. 

Officer Llano: You’re not the only generation that does crazy stuff, But now I know. /j 

Myself: Are there any future plans for community policing on campus? Is it modeled after any previous efforts at Farmingdale or elsewhere?

Chief Daugherty: Planning is based on our experiences, we have a more personal relationship with students and encourage our officers to include themselves with the community. We better serve the community through planning and communication efforts. It takes balance to be able to be a police officer and liaison, there has to be flexibility when learning how to navigate the new groups of students every year. We all have to adapt as students cycle through, creating new connections and trying to remember names. We haven’t modeled really after anyone else, but Stony Brook has their Community Response unit which is similar. But they are a much larger organization due to it being a much larger school. 

Officer Llano: They’re not as fun either. People compare their videos with ours and we’re more fun. We encourage officers to do what I’m doing because I can’t be here forever. I think they see the fun I’m having when they come to the events with me and are getting more encouraged to be involved. 

Myself: Any message you’d like to send to the Farmingdale community and students? 

Chief Daugherty: We’re here for you, to make your events successful and keep you safe. This campus is an amazing place and we want to keep it that way. We know sometimes people feel uncomfortable because of our bullet proof vests and other tools we carry but we live in a time where active shooter events are happening more and more. If that happens, we’re the ones who have to rush in and take care of the problem. Without our gear we can’t do that. Officers train at night sometimes going over active shooter drills to make sure they are prepared and are able to neutralize any potential threats. It’s a delicate balance trying not to be perceived as some sort of para military but also be able to be officers. We want you to be able to see the person behind the gear. 

Officer Llano: My message would be that you come first and that I’m here for students. You can come to us, we are here to help not just give tickets. We’ll help you jumpstart your car, help if you get locked out of your car, we give emergency aid etc. We want you to come to us and we’re continuing to work on that. 

End of Interview 

I will say that I have heard from other students about their experiences with campus police due to incidents at events or personal encounters and had a biased view towards them. Members of my family have had poor experiences with Suffolk County Police and I joined Farmingdale with an apprehensive attitude towards cops in general. Being able to sit down and speak to UPD officers who are putting in the work to try and correct

misinformation, misconceptions and promoting community on campus was refreshing. Officer Llano has assisted the Farmingdale Pride club acting as a monitor in times that queer students on campus often don’t feel safe or comfortable attending events. Communication seems to be the most important factor towards maintaining a healthy campus climate and fostering good relations with UPD. I hope this article will prove informational and help anyone who didn’t understand police presence at events. 

I will be attaching information about the Rave Guardian app to this article. It is an app that connects you straight to UPD, you’re able to report things in real time and have officers investigate. The contact information for Chief Daugherty, Officer Llano, Inspector Hauff will also be attached to this article. 

The Rave Guardian App – branded for each institution — is available for free download at the Apple App Store for iOS devices, including the iPhone/iPad and Google Play for devices running the Android operating system. On it you can: 

1. Text the UPD dispatcher directly. 
2. Call UPD directly 
3. Other safety features

Farmingdale UPD handles:

Instagram: @fsc_police

Website: www.farmingdale.edu/university-police/

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