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Can the LAPD Learn From New York? : Policing: Officials say better community relations are curbing crime here and that recent crises make a more military style a poor approach.

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TIMES STAFF WRITER

Would the New York Police Department’s new approach to crime fighting produce the same dramatic reduction in crime in Los Angeles?

Police Chief Willie L. Williams has his doubts.

“You have to approach these things differently in different cities,” the chief said in an interview. “There’s no one style that works on crime.”

In fact, Williams and other LAPD officials note that although reported crime is dropping in New York, it also is declining in Los Angeles. And Williams said that although external forces have helped to push down crime here, he gives at least some of the credit to his department, especially its effort to better engage the community.

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Williams rejects the NYPD top brass’ military approach to its mission. And New York’s numbers notwithstanding, he remains committed to the more resident-friendly style of law enforcement known as community-based policing that is unfolding across the city.

In the Blythe Street area of the San Fernando Valley, police worked with residents to identify a gang problem, then aggressively moved against it. In central and south Los Angeles, police are taking cues from residents as they seek to identify and shut down drug houses, an effort that has enjoyed notable success. And throughout the city, the LAPD is extending the reach of its Jeopardy program, trying to steer young people away from gangs.

That’s not exactly “The Art of War,” as today’s NYPD defines it. But LAPD leaders and some government officials say community-based programs are more appropriate, given the size of the department and its relationship with the communities it serves.

“We have 450 square miles and . . . less than 8,000 people,” Williams said. “New York has about 250, 275 square miles and 38,000 sworn employees to focus on crime. What that says is that in Los Angeles you have to prioritize what you deal with, you have to galvanize the community, use state and federal task forces. You have to galvanize a whole different population to work with you to deal with what may be basically the same types of crime.”

There also is the question of history. Unlike the NYPD, Los Angeles police have been the focus of much recent violence and discontent: the Rodney G. King beating, the 1992 riots and the O. J. Simpson case. One result, officials say, is that the LAPD is in no position to impose a more military-style approach to its police work.

Williams is reluctant to dwell on the department’s past crises, but acknowledges that police in Los Angeles and New York are “at different points in their history.”

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As a result, some observers are skeptical that the lessons of New York could--or should--be applied to Los Angeles. While New York may need to toughen up its approach, the LAPD’s historic embrace of militarism requires that it temper its strategy and reconnect with the community, many officials believe.

“It sounds to me as though the NYPD is acting in a much tougher, military way,” said Councilwoman Laura Chick, who heads the Public Safety Committee. “That’s not my definition of community policing.”

Raymond Kelly, a former NYPD commissioner and critic of that department’s current direction, agrees. “We are well on the way to dismantling community policing in New York,” said Kelly. “It’s a sea change in the way policing is done.”

But the new NYPD leadership is nothing if not confident.

“I honestly believe that [New York’s strategy] can work anywhere in the world,” said NYPD Deputy Commissioner for Operations Jack Maple.

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