Bike patrols connect Milwaukee Police to community
Sgt. Jeffrey Cook, commander of the Milwaukee Police Department’s bicycle patrol officers, is a longtime bike enthusiast, but he didn’t exactly volunteer for his first bike patrol assignment in 1997. Instead, he had a partner named Ed who was scheduled to go to bike patrol.
“But then Ed got a full scholarship to go to law school at Marquette,” said Cook from his workshop at the District 6 station. “My lieutenant called me into his office. He looked at Ed and he looked at me, and he said ‘You’ll fit his uniform.’”
Cook says he still goes out on patrol, but now much of his time is devoted to repairing and maintaining bikes and other equipment. He joined the department in 1995 and walked a beat in Bay View and still has a beat cop’s perspective on police work.
“When you’re face to face with people, you’re forced to interact,” said Cook. “And you find out that people, probably in the high 90s percent of people, are for you.”
Developing a good relationship with people in a neighborhood results in officers getting good information, which Cook says can sometimes prevent a crime from ever taking place.
Cook said the same philosophy applies to officers riding bikes, because they’re less intimidating than a squad car.
“When you show up in a car, everybody knows that the fun is over,” he said. “On a bike, the situation can seem more negotiable, even when it’s not.”
Sgt. Jeffrey Cook, commander of the Milwaukee Police Department’s Bicycle Patrol unit
MPD isn’t the only area law enforcement agency using bike officers; the Milwaukee County Sheriff’s Department, along with Wauwatosa, Shorewood and West Allis also have active and visible bicycle patrols.
“I think this city would be better off if we had twice as many (officers on bikes),” said Scott Radtke, co-owner of the River Horse tavern on East Center Street. “They get to know the people as opposed to the felons.”
Radtke likes that the bike cops stop in from time to time for a glass of water or a soda, and says if he has any information he’s happy to share it with them.
But better community relations isn’t the only thing bike patrols bring to the table. An officer on a bike can go places a squad car can’t — and be unnoticed.
“Say, if somebody’s breaking into a car or something, they won’t even know I’m there until I’m right on top of them,” said Officer Steven Roufus while Cook made an adjustment to his bike.
When Cook took over the bike unit in 2008, he got $86,000 from seized assets to replace old bikes and other equipment. He implemented a one-rider, one-bike policy to ensure that when there was a problem with a bike it could be fixed promptly and fit each rider correctly. Cook estimates he also saved the city $7,500 to $10,000 in maintenance costs last year by doing most of the work in-house.
The District 6 repair shop also houses a wide array of stolen or abandoned bikes recovered by police and unclaimed, which the department donates to the Bicycle Federation of Wisconsin.
Bike Federation Education Project Manager Jake Newborn said that last summer he got approximately 150 bikes from the police and he hopes to get 100 more in the near future. Newborn works with at-risk Milwaukee youths at the Valid Bike Shop, located in North Division High School. Kids get school credit or paid training to learn how to fix bikes through the program.
“Some of them are beyond repair, and we just strip them for parts,” said Newborn, “and some just need air in the tires.” Some adult-sized bikes are refurbished and sold to pay for supplies for the shop.”
Bicycle patrol officers are experimenting with carrying the Toughbook computer used in squad cars, transporting them in waterproof saddlebags. Cook said that the computers are tough enough to survive being dropped on the pavement if an officer has to react to a situation quickly, and that four to six patrol teams per shift have the computers, depending on how many are available. Squad cars get top priority for the computers.
“But with the pace of technology,” said Cook, “I’m sure it’s only a matter of time before we have something the size of a cell phone.”
MPD is using a sworn officer as a bicycle mechanic???? One would think it would be better to either hire a part-time civilian mechanic, or to have a local bicycle shop do the maintenance. Having a sworn officer officer working as a bicycle mechanic seems like a misuse of police resources.
I like seeing the bike cops in my hood. I don’t like the fact that they ride bikes made in China with only marginal quality parts when WI has a long history of making great bikes. I think a study would show that total cost of ownership would be reduced if quality made in america bikes were used. Not to mention helping out the WI economy instead of China.