May 30, 2025 • 17 mins
What happens when the people who respond to everyone else's worst moments need help themselves? In this episode of Cape CopCast 'Chief's Chat,' Chief Anthony Sizemore brings us inside the cultural transformation at Cape Coral Police Department, where officer wellness has evolved from a taboo topic decades ago to an organizational priority.
The stark reality of law enforcement creates a unique mental health challenge: officers and professional law enforcement staff witness trauma at rates far exceeding the general population while balancing family responsibilities and the everyday stresses of life. For far too long, seeking help was viewed as weakness. Today, the Cape Coral Police Department is leading a different approach, deliberately weaving wellness into every aspect of department operations.
From developing a robust peer support program to applying for federal wellness grants, the department is investing in comprehensive solutions. The initiatives cover physical fitness, healthy meal planning, family support systems, and leadership training focused on early intervention. Chief Sizemore shares how supervisors are being equipped to recognize warning signs – late arrivals, behavior changes, performance issues – that might indicate an officer is struggling, and to respond with compassion while maintaining accountability.
This isn't just about officer wellbeing; it directly impacts public safety. As Chief Sizemore explains, "A well officer is better for the community because that's what's going to be showing up to your home." When officers have tools to process their own trauma, they're better equipped to help people during crisis moments. By transforming how they support their people, the department is ultimately enhancing how they serve Cape Coral.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:04):
Welcome back to another episode of the Cape Cop
cast Chiefs chat edition.
I'm one of your hosts LisaGreenberg, mercedes is still on
maternity leave and, of course,I am joined by Chief Sizemore.
Speaker 2 (00:15):
How you doing this week.
I'm good.
How are you?
Speaker 1 (00:17):
Good.
My voice sounds a little raspy,but I promise I'm okay.
I sound worse than I feel.
I feel good.
Speaker 2 (00:22):
I hope so.
We're in a closed space andwe're talking about health and
wellness today.
Speaker 1 (00:25):
So I think it's probably good that I addressed
that up front that we're good togo.
I know we kind of wanted to diginto all of the different
initiatives that we're rollingout that focus on the health and
wellness of our department.
This is something that's been apriority for you.
Really, since I've started thishas been a conversation, but
especially in the last sixmonths or so it's really started
to ramp up.
Speaker 2 (00:46):
Yeah, I mean we're late in the month, but it is
Mental.
Speaker 1 (00:49):
Health.
Speaker 2 (00:50):
Awareness Month and we've talked on the podcast.
But we talk in the communityand we talk in the building
about all the initiatives andCIT, Crisis Intervention
Training that we do for ourinteractions with members of the
public.
It's big, it's very front ofmind, our interactions with
members of the public.
It's big, it's very front ofmind.
But one of the things that'sbehind the scenes to the public
but very front of mind in thisbuilding is health and wellness
(01:10):
initiatives for our people.
Speaker 1 (01:12):
This is something that's such a priority to our
department that we've evenstarted including health and
wellness related content in ourmonthly newsletter.
That's something that you knowdifferent tips, different tools,
different resources for people,so they have that right at
their fingertips as well.
Speaker 2 (01:28):
Right, all of the things that the community is
doing and we are doing with thecommunity.
You look at the NAMI walk thatwe just did.
The whole purpose of the NAMIwalk is to get the conversation
out right.
You don't want to hide mentalhealth and wellness from
positive initiatives to peoplein crisis.
Well, the same thing happenshere.
We don't hide it.
That used to be the case, right?
(01:50):
I'm almost 30 years in the bizand in the beginning of my
career you just did not talkabout it.
It was a tough job.
You deal with it If you neededhelp.
It really was looked upon as asign of weakness and a big
mistake for the profession.
So what we're doing now isgetting the conversation out, to
(02:11):
normalize it.
So it's not weird and it'scertainly not a sign of weakness
to say, hey, I'm dealing with alot.
We're seeing a lot of thingschild drownings, death
investigations, domesticviolence.
Just your own personalstruggles with schedule and
juggling kids and paying billsand regular life like everybody
(02:35):
else has.
We're not immune to that.
And then on top of that, youput traumatic events that you
see Even here in Cape Coral.
We see as officers andprofessional staff it's not just
the officers, but people thatwork in this building are
exposed to a really higherdegree of exposure to traumatic
things than the average personand we're normal people.
(02:59):
that compounds and it can have atoll or take a toll on you.
Speaker 1 (03:03):
I remember shortly after I started here, we had the
death of Kayla Rincon Millerand the communication.
After that happened, I rememberhearing oh, if you worked on
this, call you know.
Please come talk to me.
We want to make sure thatyou're doing okay.
Because so many of the officersat the time of the scene
thought, okay, she obviously wasshot, but she's going to be
(03:25):
okay.
And then to hear this, I knowit had a big impact, so they
were checking on the officersthat were on that scene and
that's more common now.
Speaker 2 (03:34):
Absolutely, and it's obviously the officers on the
scene.
We had officers thatadministered CPR and life-saving
measures and you go into thatbelieving that you're going to
win.
You're going to succeed, we'regoing to get her back because
we've done that, and when youdon't, it's a shock and it hurts
.
And even yourself, right,you're in our public affairs
(03:56):
team.
You need to be up to speed onwhat's going on, so you're privy
to a lot of meetings.
Right, you're in the room, soyou're hearing that.
And it's a it's a level oftrauma for you and it's a level
of trauma for our records,personnel, who, who read and
redact or watch body camerafootage, um, all the way up to
including, obviously, the frontlines.
It can be a lot.
So what do you do with that?
(04:17):
Right?
So you want to have umintentional form formulated, um
measures and efforts forwellness for our officers,
because a well officer, totalbody wellness, physically fit
but emotionally prepared, isbetter for the community,
(04:37):
because that's what's going tobe showing up to your home.
You want somebody who's not umoverwhelmed you know, and and a
smoldering wreckage to show upat your house with your crisis
because you want to get topflight service and you got to
make sure that the theindividual showing up is
prepared to do that.
So we invest in the human beingbecause we believe in in people
(04:58):
out on the public, but alsoalso our own people.
But also it delivers a betterproduct by doing that.
Speaker 1 (05:03):
Definitely, you want the people who are responding to
your crisis to not be dealingwith their own crises.
It's crises, crises, crises.
I know recently, too, we hadleadership training for all of
our command staff, for thepeople who are in top positions
here within the department, tokind of help create a model for
this and also, to you know, itstarts at the top down.
(05:26):
If our leadership isn'tbelieving in this, if our
leadership isn't learning aboutthis, if our leadership isn't
handling this, how are we goingto expect the people all the way
down to believe in it and buyinto it?
So we recently had thatleadership training that was
focused on health and wellness.
Speaker 2 (05:40):
We did.
A good friend of mine, chiefNeil Gang, who is out in Pinole,
california, the Bay Area ofCalifornia is, I would say, one
of, but I believe he is theleader in the police officer
wellness space.
So I met him throughprofessional networking and
developed a friendship with himand I was really impressed with
what he was doing with hisdepartment and it was starting
(06:01):
to spread about intentionalwellness.
And what I learned from him iswe've always had little bits and
pieces of wellness here.
You could go talk to somebody.
We have EAP or employeeassistance program.
We've had critical incidentstress debriefings that were
mandated.
You go and you quote, unquote,talk about it and then we check
(06:24):
the box.
We're good, we're doing that.
And what I found is thatwellness in an organization
isn't a program.
It's not a person like oh,you're not feeling well, go see
Lisa, she's our person.
That's not it.
A true wellness program is nota program at all.
It's woven into the fabric ofthe entire organization, from
(06:44):
myself believing in it andsupporting it all the way down
to the newest member, all jobshere, whether you're a
professional staff or swornofficer, a high-ranking person
or just started yesterday thatyou need to understand that
(07:05):
wellness is a major component ofwhat we do here.
It's not just one group or oneoffice that does it.
It's woven and sprinkled intoeverything that we do.
So a ounce of prevention isworth a pound of cure.
So we proactively do thingslike peer support.
We are initializing a robust,formalized peer support program
here whereby we get training sothat our people aren't doctors
(07:27):
or psychologists but they knowhow to provide peer support at
all levels of the organization.
So if you're a sergeant, youmay not feel comfortable doing
peer support with a line levelperson.
Maybe you do, but maybe youdon't.
So we have somebody that's anappropriate rank for you.
(07:48):
We are excited to apply for agrant.
It's an acronym called theLIMWA grant and that's Law
Enforcement Health and WellnessGrant, and it's through the
Department of Justice, the COPSor Community Oriented Policing
Grant.
That grant, providing service,has been around since the 90s.
They provide police officersand community policing efforts,
but they also have a specificgrant for health and wellness
(08:11):
and we have applied for it.
I'm very confident that we'regoing to do well with it.
It's a robust grant that we canget and one of the important
things here is there's no localmatch and what that means when
you get grants, sometimes thereis local match applied to it.
It's just like that If you get$10, then you have to match it
(08:32):
with a percentage.
Either 100% would be we give you$10, you provide $10, or a
different percentage.
There is no local match forthis, so it's money provided
because nationally that thisconversation is getting around
and there's a high level of ofofficer suicides annually and we
believe that number is greatlyunderreported.
(08:52):
We're a larger organization.
We're almost 500 people in ourorganization.
We're the eighth largest cityand the third biggest state.
We talk about that foreverything for crime, but also
for things like the socialissues.
If it's out there, it's in here.
We're not unique.
We experience all of the thingsthat other larger places are
(09:13):
having.
So we need to take a proactivestance or posture and apply for
things like that, and I'mexcited because it will enable
us to bring on a wellnesscoordinator to be trained
through the IACP or theInternational Association of
Chiefs of Police.
They're big into wellness, iacpor the International
Association of Chiefs of Police.
They're big into wellness, sothey have a defined curriculum
(09:34):
that we are working towardsgetting funding from the COPS
grant and taking justinitiatives within the building,
because it is serious, Ibelieve in it and I think that
the public will reap thebenefits in spades.
Speaker 1 (09:50):
A hundred percent.
We can't preach it to ourcommunity.
We can't be saying, oh, ourofficers have crisis
intervention training to helpyou at home, or to help your
neighbor or to help the kids inschools, without actually
turning inward, looking atourselves and making sure that
we're taking those same steps toprotect us and our people.
(10:10):
So I think it makes sense.
And another focus of all this,too, is physical health, because
we are in a time where it'smore difficult to be healthier.
When it comes to diet, exercise, there's just so many different
factors that weren't at playeven when you started.
Physical health is also ofimportance here.
Speaker 2 (10:31):
It's a big key towards mental health.
They're not in silos right.
They all work together totalbody wellness.
So we have a gym here at thepolice department.
It's nice too, it's a very nicegym and we've we've had it for
since we've been in the building.
But we are intentional and outloud about our willingness to
(10:53):
allow people to work out, stayphysically fit.
It's good for health insurancecosts, it's good for a lot of
different things, but for theindividual right.
We're a people-firstorganization.
So we want the Cape CoralPolice Department to succeed and
to do well, but you can't yellat an inanimate object like
police department.
Get better.
You have to address individualsand we encourage our
(11:15):
individuals to have access tothat gym.
The wellness coordinator willhelp with healthy meal planning.
It's cheap and easy to be outof shape and lazy right.
Food is cheaper.
The options are very convenientto go the wrong way.
So we're going to teach peoplehow to live a busy lifestyle and
be healthy, provide access tophysical fitness, have a robust
(11:40):
peer support plan.
We adopted something called theAsher model at our police
department that has sevendifferent components from our
robust 30-year chaplaincyprogram where, if you need faith
assistance, we have it for you.
Family support, because it's notjust you, it's you.
(12:01):
Go home to a family, so weembrace the family and that's
one of the new initiatives thatwe're doing is welcoming the
support system of our newofficers when they come in, when
they onboard, providingride-along, training and
show-and-tells andmeet-and-greets with the family
so they know what their lovedone is getting into and the
officers and support staff thatwe hire will know that their
(12:23):
family supports what they'redoing and that helps with
wellness.
And then, when they need totalk to somebody, encouraging it
, providing the resources forthem to be able to do that and
not stigmatizing it.
Encouraging people to get help,not treating them as broken or
damaged or weak, but that's ashow of strength to be able to
do that and we celebrate that.
(12:43):
So that's the shift and that'sreally the definition of what
the total package of a robusthealth and wellness program in
our organization is.
Speaker 1 (12:54):
And what's the timeline you think for all of
this, with the grant and hiringa wellness coordinator?
Knock wood, assuming it allgoes according to plan.
Do we have a timeline?
Speaker 2 (13:03):
The timeline has already started and we're into
the program.
It's not something that yougear up and then you know, like
the start of a race.
We've already begun in earnest,where we had the formalized
training to come in and I wasmentioning my buddy Chief Gang
and he talked to us aboutleading in a wellness-oriented
culture.
So it's not just police stuffover here and touchy-feely
(13:27):
wellness over here.
It's integrating the two Right,both with our interactions with
the public, but also ourinteractions in the building and
then your interaction withyourself.
And it was for our frontlinesupervisors and middle managers
that actually touch and shapeand influence our officers and
our professional staff at theline level how to lead in a
(13:48):
wellness culture.
Because when people areexperiencing a crisis, it
doesn't manifest itselfdifferently.
It's not I'm having a crisis,no, it's I'm showing up late,
there's some absenteeism, theremay be some complaints about
your demeanor, there may be latework turning in, and there are
times and there are many timeswhen people just exhibit that
(14:08):
because something's going on,but it may not be a crisis or
bomb going off in their life,but a lot of times it is, and
that's the beginning of it,that's the ticking of the bomb.
So what we do is we learn howto intercede and intervene as a
leader with those people in theearly steps or, if they're in
(14:29):
crisis, to be able to navigate,know the resources and how to
just lead with care and stillhold people accountable, still
be mission driven but also do ina humanistic way that people
will want to be here and help.
You know, inspire and get arobust, healthy workforce.
Speaker 1 (14:48):
I've heard conversations that you've had
where it's been, you know, oh,such and such person is starting
to be a little more late.
Their attitude's changing.
Bring them up, let's have atalk with them, make sure
everything's going okay.
That's kind of the culture thatwe have here, so I think it's
only natural that these are ournext steps.
Speaker 2 (15:07):
Right.
The only time that you see meshould not be when you're sworn
in and when you're in bigtrouble.
If you get in little trouble,you deal with your supervisors,
but you've got to come see thechief.
That shouldn't be an automaticnegative.
We do things enough so that itdoesn't become weird.
So if I'm hearing that aboutsomebody, I we all have, but I'm
(15:33):
accountable for we've investedin you, in money, in time, in
care, and when we hear thatthere's something going on I'm
not the only one, but I will dothat I will reach out and say
hey, are we not providing youwith all of the tools to succeed
?
Do you have the equipment thatyou need?
Do you have all the trainingthat you need?
Are you deficient in some way?
(15:54):
Is something going on at home?
My wife lost her job, or my kidis very, very sick, or I'm
caring for a sick parent now.
Now that we know that we canhelp and we can eliminate the
problem, but we can help youmitigate the problem or provide
you with steps to ease thatburden.
That's the thing about wellnessprograms they don't eliminate
(16:16):
things from life.
They give you the tools and theability to deal with them.
And that's what it's about isreaching out to people, finding
root causes, giving them tools,giving them the ability to
provide self-care and make abetter, more sustainable human
being.
That's good for them period.
(16:37):
That could be the end of thesentence.
But it also is good for theirteammates.
It's good for the people thatthey interact with in the
community and by all of thoseindividuals doing that.
That raises an organization andraises the service that we
deliver and puts us on path toachieving our vision, which is
to be the best police departmentin the state of Florida.
Speaker 1 (16:55):
Absolutely All right, chief anything else?
Speaker 2 (16:58):
Be well.
Speaker 1 (16:59):
Be well everyone and have a safe weekend.
Thank you so much for joiningus and we'll see you next time.
Welcome back to another episode of the Cape Cop
cast Chiefs chat edition.
I'm one of your hosts LisaGreenberg, mercedes is still on
maternity leave and, of course,I am joined by Chief Sizemore.
Speaker 2 (00:15):
How you doing this week.
I'm good.
How are you?
Speaker 1 (00:17):
Good.
My voice sounds a little raspy,but I promise I'm okay.
I sound worse than I feel.
I feel good.
Speaker 2 (00:22):
I hope so.
We're in a closed space andwe're talking about health and
wellness today.
Speaker 1 (00:25):
So I think it's probably good that I addressed
that up front that we're good togo.
I know we kind of wanted to diginto all of the different
initiatives that we're rollingout that focus on the health and
wellness of our department.
This is something that's been apriority for you.
Really, since I've started thishas been a conversation, but
especially in the last sixmonths or so it's really started
to ramp up.
Speaker 2 (00:46):
Yeah, I mean we're late in the month, but it is
Mental.
Speaker 1 (00:49):
Health.
Speaker 2 (00:50):
Awareness Month and we've talked on the podcast.
But we talk in the communityand we talk in the building
about all the initiatives andCIT, Crisis Intervention
Training that we do for ourinteractions with members of the
public.
It's big, it's very front ofmind, our interactions with
members of the public.
It's big, it's very front ofmind.
But one of the things that'sbehind the scenes to the public
but very front of mind in thisbuilding is health and wellness
(01:10):
initiatives for our people.
Speaker 1 (01:12):
This is something that's such a priority to our
department that we've evenstarted including health and
wellness related content in ourmonthly newsletter.
That's something that you knowdifferent tips, different tools,
different resources for people,so they have that right at
their fingertips as well.
Speaker 2 (01:28):
Right, all of the things that the community is
doing and we are doing with thecommunity.
You look at the NAMI walk thatwe just did.
The whole purpose of the NAMIwalk is to get the conversation
out right.
You don't want to hide mentalhealth and wellness from
positive initiatives to peoplein crisis.
Well, the same thing happenshere.
We don't hide it.
That used to be the case, right?
(01:50):
I'm almost 30 years in the bizand in the beginning of my
career you just did not talkabout it.
It was a tough job.
You deal with it If you neededhelp.
It really was looked upon as asign of weakness and a big
mistake for the profession.
So what we're doing now isgetting the conversation out, to
(02:11):
normalize it.
So it's not weird and it'scertainly not a sign of weakness
to say, hey, I'm dealing with alot.
We're seeing a lot of thingschild drownings, death
investigations, domesticviolence.
Just your own personalstruggles with schedule and
juggling kids and paying billsand regular life like everybody
(02:35):
else has.
We're not immune to that.
And then on top of that, youput traumatic events that you
see Even here in Cape Coral.
We see as officers andprofessional staff it's not just
the officers, but people thatwork in this building are
exposed to a really higherdegree of exposure to traumatic
things than the average personand we're normal people.
(02:59):
that compounds and it can have atoll or take a toll on you.
Speaker 1 (03:03):
I remember shortly after I started here, we had the
death of Kayla Rincon Millerand the communication.
After that happened, I rememberhearing oh, if you worked on
this, call you know.
Please come talk to me.
We want to make sure thatyou're doing okay.
Because so many of the officersat the time of the scene
thought, okay, she obviously wasshot, but she's going to be
(03:25):
okay.
And then to hear this, I knowit had a big impact, so they
were checking on the officersthat were on that scene and
that's more common now.
Speaker 2 (03:34):
Absolutely, and it's obviously the officers on the
scene.
We had officers thatadministered CPR and life-saving
measures and you go into thatbelieving that you're going to
win.
You're going to succeed, we'regoing to get her back because
we've done that, and when youdon't, it's a shock and it hurts
.
And even yourself, right,you're in our public affairs
(03:56):
team.
You need to be up to speed onwhat's going on, so you're privy
to a lot of meetings.
Right, you're in the room, soyou're hearing that.
And it's a it's a level oftrauma for you and it's a level
of trauma for our records,personnel, who, who read and
redact or watch body camerafootage, um, all the way up to
including, obviously, the frontlines.
It can be a lot.
So what do you do with that?
(04:17):
Right?
So you want to have umintentional form formulated, um
measures and efforts forwellness for our officers,
because a well officer, totalbody wellness, physically fit
but emotionally prepared, isbetter for the community,
(04:37):
because that's what's going tobe showing up to your home.
You want somebody who's not umoverwhelmed you know, and and a
smoldering wreckage to show upat your house with your crisis
because you want to get topflight service and you got to
make sure that the theindividual showing up is
prepared to do that.
So we invest in the human beingbecause we believe in in people
(04:58):
out on the public, but alsoalso our own people.
But also it delivers a betterproduct by doing that.
Speaker 1 (05:03):
Definitely, you want the people who are responding to
your crisis to not be dealingwith their own crises.
It's crises, crises, crises.
I know recently, too, we hadleadership training for all of
our command staff, for thepeople who are in top positions
here within the department, tokind of help create a model for
this and also, to you know, itstarts at the top down.
(05:26):
If our leadership isn'tbelieving in this, if our
leadership isn't learning aboutthis, if our leadership isn't
handling this, how are we goingto expect the people all the way
down to believe in it and buyinto it?
So we recently had thatleadership training that was
focused on health and wellness.
Speaker 2 (05:40):
We did.
A good friend of mine, chiefNeil Gang, who is out in Pinole,
california, the Bay Area ofCalifornia is, I would say, one
of, but I believe he is theleader in the police officer
wellness space.
So I met him throughprofessional networking and
developed a friendship with himand I was really impressed with
what he was doing with hisdepartment and it was starting
(06:01):
to spread about intentionalwellness.
And what I learned from him iswe've always had little bits and
pieces of wellness here.
You could go talk to somebody.
We have EAP or employeeassistance program.
We've had critical incidentstress debriefings that were
mandated.
You go and you quote, unquote,talk about it and then we check
(06:24):
the box.
We're good, we're doing that.
And what I found is thatwellness in an organization
isn't a program.
It's not a person like oh,you're not feeling well, go see
Lisa, she's our person.
That's not it.
A true wellness program is nota program at all.
It's woven into the fabric ofthe entire organization, from
(06:44):
myself believing in it andsupporting it all the way down
to the newest member, all jobshere, whether you're a
professional staff or swornofficer, a high-ranking person
or just started yesterday thatyou need to understand that
(07:05):
wellness is a major component ofwhat we do here.
It's not just one group or oneoffice that does it.
It's woven and sprinkled intoeverything that we do.
So a ounce of prevention isworth a pound of cure.
So we proactively do thingslike peer support.
We are initializing a robust,formalized peer support program
here whereby we get training sothat our people aren't doctors
(07:27):
or psychologists but they knowhow to provide peer support at
all levels of the organization.
So if you're a sergeant, youmay not feel comfortable doing
peer support with a line levelperson.
Maybe you do, but maybe youdon't.
So we have somebody that's anappropriate rank for you.
(07:48):
We are excited to apply for agrant.
It's an acronym called theLIMWA grant and that's Law
Enforcement Health and WellnessGrant, and it's through the
Department of Justice, the COPSor Community Oriented Policing
Grant.
That grant, providing service,has been around since the 90s.
They provide police officersand community policing efforts,
but they also have a specificgrant for health and wellness
(08:11):
and we have applied for it.
I'm very confident that we'regoing to do well with it.
It's a robust grant that we canget and one of the important
things here is there's no localmatch and what that means when
you get grants, sometimes thereis local match applied to it.
It's just like that If you get$10, then you have to match it
(08:32):
with a percentage.
Either 100% would be we give you$10, you provide $10, or a
different percentage.
There is no local match forthis, so it's money provided
because nationally that thisconversation is getting around
and there's a high level of ofofficer suicides annually and we
believe that number is greatlyunderreported.
(08:52):
We're a larger organization.
We're almost 500 people in ourorganization.
We're the eighth largest cityand the third biggest state.
We talk about that foreverything for crime, but also
for things like the socialissues.
If it's out there, it's in here.
We're not unique.
We experience all of the thingsthat other larger places are
(09:13):
having.
So we need to take a proactivestance or posture and apply for
things like that, and I'mexcited because it will enable
us to bring on a wellnesscoordinator to be trained
through the IACP or theInternational Association of
Chiefs of Police.
They're big into wellness, iacpor the International
Association of Chiefs of Police.
They're big into wellness, sothey have a defined curriculum
(09:34):
that we are working towardsgetting funding from the COPS
grant and taking justinitiatives within the building,
because it is serious, Ibelieve in it and I think that
the public will reap thebenefits in spades.
Speaker 1 (09:50):
A hundred percent.
We can't preach it to ourcommunity.
We can't be saying, oh, ourofficers have crisis
intervention training to helpyou at home, or to help your
neighbor or to help the kids inschools, without actually
turning inward, looking atourselves and making sure that
we're taking those same steps toprotect us and our people.
(10:10):
So I think it makes sense.
And another focus of all this,too, is physical health, because
we are in a time where it'smore difficult to be healthier.
When it comes to diet, exercise, there's just so many different
factors that weren't at playeven when you started.
Physical health is also ofimportance here.
Speaker 2 (10:31):
It's a big key towards mental health.
They're not in silos right.
They all work together totalbody wellness.
So we have a gym here at thepolice department.
It's nice too, it's a very nicegym and we've we've had it for
since we've been in the building.
But we are intentional and outloud about our willingness to
(10:53):
allow people to work out, stayphysically fit.
It's good for health insurancecosts, it's good for a lot of
different things, but for theindividual right.
We're a people-firstorganization.
So we want the Cape CoralPolice Department to succeed and
to do well, but you can't yellat an inanimate object like
police department.
Get better.
You have to address individualsand we encourage our
(11:15):
individuals to have access tothat gym.
The wellness coordinator willhelp with healthy meal planning.
It's cheap and easy to be outof shape and lazy right.
Food is cheaper.
The options are very convenientto go the wrong way.
So we're going to teach peoplehow to live a busy lifestyle and
be healthy, provide access tophysical fitness, have a robust
(11:40):
peer support plan.
We adopted something called theAsher model at our police
department that has sevendifferent components from our
robust 30-year chaplaincyprogram where, if you need faith
assistance, we have it for you.
Family support, because it's notjust you, it's you.
(12:01):
Go home to a family, so weembrace the family and that's
one of the new initiatives thatwe're doing is welcoming the
support system of our newofficers when they come in, when
they onboard, providingride-along, training and
show-and-tells andmeet-and-greets with the family
so they know what their lovedone is getting into and the
officers and support staff thatwe hire will know that their
(12:23):
family supports what they'redoing and that helps with
wellness.
And then, when they need totalk to somebody, encouraging it
, providing the resources forthem to be able to do that and
not stigmatizing it.
Encouraging people to get help,not treating them as broken or
damaged or weak, but that's ashow of strength to be able to
do that and we celebrate that.
(12:43):
So that's the shift and that'sreally the definition of what
the total package of a robusthealth and wellness program in
our organization is.
Speaker 1 (12:54):
And what's the timeline you think for all of
this, with the grant and hiringa wellness coordinator?
Knock wood, assuming it allgoes according to plan.
Do we have a timeline?
Speaker 2 (13:03):
The timeline has already started and we're into
the program.
It's not something that yougear up and then you know, like
the start of a race.
We've already begun in earnest,where we had the formalized
training to come in and I wasmentioning my buddy Chief Gang
and he talked to us aboutleading in a wellness-oriented
culture.
So it's not just police stuffover here and touchy-feely
(13:27):
wellness over here.
It's integrating the two Right,both with our interactions with
the public, but also ourinteractions in the building and
then your interaction withyourself.
And it was for our frontlinesupervisors and middle managers
that actually touch and shapeand influence our officers and
our professional staff at theline level how to lead in a
(13:48):
wellness culture.
Because when people areexperiencing a crisis, it
doesn't manifest itselfdifferently.
It's not I'm having a crisis,no, it's I'm showing up late,
there's some absenteeism, theremay be some complaints about
your demeanor, there may be latework turning in, and there are
times and there are many timeswhen people just exhibit that
(14:08):
because something's going on,but it may not be a crisis or
bomb going off in their life,but a lot of times it is, and
that's the beginning of it,that's the ticking of the bomb.
So what we do is we learn howto intercede and intervene as a
leader with those people in theearly steps or, if they're in
(14:29):
crisis, to be able to navigate,know the resources and how to
just lead with care and stillhold people accountable, still
be mission driven but also do ina humanistic way that people
will want to be here and help.
You know, inspire and get arobust, healthy workforce.
Speaker 1 (14:48):
I've heard conversations that you've had
where it's been, you know, oh,such and such person is starting
to be a little more late.
Their attitude's changing.
Bring them up, let's have atalk with them, make sure
everything's going okay.
That's kind of the culture thatwe have here, so I think it's
only natural that these are ournext steps.
Speaker 2 (15:07):
Right.
The only time that you see meshould not be when you're sworn
in and when you're in bigtrouble.
If you get in little trouble,you deal with your supervisors,
but you've got to come see thechief.
That shouldn't be an automaticnegative.
We do things enough so that itdoesn't become weird.
So if I'm hearing that aboutsomebody, I we all have, but I'm
(15:33):
accountable for we've investedin you, in money, in time, in
care, and when we hear thatthere's something going on I'm
not the only one, but I will dothat I will reach out and say
hey, are we not providing youwith all of the tools to succeed
?
Do you have the equipment thatyou need?
Do you have all the trainingthat you need?
Are you deficient in some way?
(15:54):
Is something going on at home?
My wife lost her job, or my kidis very, very sick, or I'm
caring for a sick parent now.
Now that we know that we canhelp and we can eliminate the
problem, but we can help youmitigate the problem or provide
you with steps to ease thatburden.
That's the thing about wellnessprograms they don't eliminate
(16:16):
things from life.
They give you the tools and theability to deal with them.
And that's what it's about isreaching out to people, finding
root causes, giving them tools,giving them the ability to
provide self-care and make abetter, more sustainable human
being.
That's good for them period.
(16:37):
That could be the end of thesentence.
But it also is good for theirteammates.
It's good for the people thatthey interact with in the
community and by all of thoseindividuals doing that.
That raises an organization andraises the service that we
deliver and puts us on path toachieving our vision, which is
to be the best police departmentin the state of Florida.
Speaker 1 (16:55):
Absolutely All right, chief anything else?
Speaker 2 (16:58):
Be well.
Speaker 1 (16:59):
Be well everyone and have a safe weekend.
Thank you so much for joiningus and we'll see you next time.
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