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Dear Editor,

  This week we have had two peaceful demonstrations in Henry County. The Henry County Police Department respects and supports your First Amendment right to assemble and protest. We want to thank you for having the trust and confidence in your police department to protect your rights.

  We are in the community and for the community. Our officers live in the community they serve. We drive on the same roads, shop at the same stores, our children go to the same schools, and we attend the same churches. The men and women of the Henry County Police Department have the same concerns as the public we serve.

  We are committed to ensuring that community policing remains a priority, by reaching out and being available for our citizens, not just during trying times, but all of the time. I recognize that we are all in this together and acknowledge that more work needs to be done to demonstrate our commitment to our community. This can only be accomplished through partnerships, collaboration and conversations. We look to have more engagement with the community, such as our officers taking a few moments to throw a football with the neighborhood kids, speaking with HOA’s on how to start a neighborhood watch, and how to serve as mentors in the place we all call home.

  We will continue to educate ourselves in ways to serve our citizens, our businesses and our visitors with integrity and compassion. When we see an opportunity to do things better, we act upon it, much in the way we have done in the area of dealing proactively and compassionately with people who suffer from mental health issues, or the initiative we launched on how to de-escalate use of force situations with words, not force. We will continue to look for ways to become even more transparent, which was an initiative that began with the use of body worn cameras for all street police officers.

  As we move forward, it will take the entire community to work together to fix, change, and progress into a future in which we all want to live. One Henry, Henry Strong!

Mark Amerman
Chief of Police
Henry County Police Department