Ocean City Police Department Awarded Re-Accreditation

OCEAN CITY – On April 15,, Chief Chad Callahan, Captain Jay Prettyman, Lieutenant Gene Sharpe and Accreditation Manager Jennifer Barbato traveled to Princeton, New Jersey to answer a panel review from the New Jersey State Association of Chiefs of Police Accreditation Program Commission.
Following the panel review, the Ocean City Police Department was awarded Re-Accreditation status for the next three years from the Accreditation Commission. In order to meet the requirements of the program the Ocean City Police had to meet and comply with 110 nationally recognized standards.
The Ocean City Police Department received their initial Accreditation status on May 16, 2006. There are many benefits to having the police department meet these rigorous standards of law enforcement accreditation. Some include but are not limited to;
• Controlled liability insurance costs
• Stronger defense against lawsuits and citizen complaints
• Greater accountability within the agency
• Staunch support from government official
• Increased community advocacy
The accreditation process requires an in-depth review of every aspect of the agency’s organization, management, operations and administration. This includes an establishment of the agency’s goals and objectives, re-evaluation of agency resources in accordance with the goals, objectives and mission statement, re-evaluation of agency policies and procedures as documented in the agency’s written directive system and correction of internal deficiencies and inefficiencies before they become a problem.
The accreditation process provides norms against which agency performance can be measured and monitored over time. It allows an agency to utilize objective measures to justify decisions related to budget requests and personnel policies.
Moreover, accreditation streamlines an agency’s operations, providing more consistency and more effective deployment of agency manpower.
The Ocean City Accreditation program is managed by Jennifer Barbato, Accreditation Manager, and supported by Chief Chad Callahan. Chief Callahan remarked that “ It’s was an honor in 2006 in being the 8th municipality to become accredited and now re-accredited in 2010 as a result of the hard work by Officer Barbato with the cooperation of the entire Department .
As such, we continue today to being committed in providing police services according to nationally recognized standards and best practices identified throughout the international law enforcement community.”