Last

weekend, the Peachtree City Police Department

received its national reaccreditation from the

Commission on Accreditation for Law Enforcement

Agencies Inc.

This

is the department's second reaccreditation. It

was first accredited by the group in 1992, making

Peachtree City the 243rd department in the nation

to do so.

The

honor was bestowed after what is typically a

grueling interview process with the commission,

said Peachtree City Police Chief Jim Murray. The

commissioners typically grill department

representatives before approving or failing to

approve the department for accreditation.

When

Peachtree City's police officials were

interviewed, however, only one commissioner had

any questions. And he had only one: "I want

you to tell us as the commission how we can do a

better job because you are doing a better job

than us."

Murray

said that statement was very flattering of the

department's efforts to maintain its

accreditation, which the commission can choose to

revoke if it sees fit. It also gave pride to the

nine officers who chose to attend the

reaccreditation hearing on their own time and

their own dime, Murray said.

"Nobody

says we're perfect, but this is one of the ways

we're trying to get better at what we do,"

Murray added.

Sgt.

Rosanna Dove is the department's reaccreditation

manager. She makes sure the department follows

all the rules and regulations needed to keep the

department's accreditation, Murray said.

Individual

officers also are involved in the accreditation

process on a daily basis relating to the

activities they do, the chief added.

"This

is a team effort," Murray said.

The

accreditation process requires the departments to

follow 276 mandatory standards "to the

letter," said Murray. Those standards cover

such issues as use of deadly force, crime

prevention and fiscal management. Far more topics

are actually covered by the standards, which each

have about 25 to 30 substandards that must also

be followed to the letter, Murray noted.

In

addition to making sure that policies are in

place for those issues, the standards also

require that when certain incidents take place,

they must be evaluated to insure policies and

procedures were followed, Murray said. That goes

for times when deadly force is used all the way

to how the department handles special details

like the Fourth of July parade.

"You

have to evaluate what happened so you can see how

you can do it better," Murray said.

The

standards also cover what each police car should

be equipped with and various other similar

details the agencies must adhere to, Murray said.

Also,

each department must follow at least 80 percent

of non-mandatory standards, he added.

Peachtree

City met 99 percent of those non-mandatory

standards, Murray noted.

"We

don't just want to pass. We want to do

exceptionally well," Murray said.

One

of the standards Peachtree City couldn't meet had

to do with its holding facility, which can't

house prisoners for more than four hours at a

time, Murray explained.

To

gain reaccreditation, the department was

inspected in April by a team of law enforcement

officers from outside the state. In addition to

reviewing files the department keeps on hand, the

team members also rode with patrolmen on the

midnight shift and asked questions of members of

the public.

That

evaluation process also included a public hearing

to allow for citizen comment on the operations of

the Police Department.

There

are fewer than 500 nationally accredited law

enforcement agencies in the nation out of over

18,000 in existence, Murray said.

Maj.

Mike DuPree helps evaluate other agencies for

accreditation, and that in turn helps the

Peachtree City Police Department get new ideas

for improving its reaccreditation process, Murray

said.

Though

Peachtree City is the 13th largest city in

Georgia, it has a very low crime rate, Murray

said. He also said the 53 officers staffing the

department provides a lower number of police

officers per citizen than the national average.

Peachtree

City has 1.6 officers per 1,000 citizens compared

to a normal rate of 1.8 officers per 1,000

citizens for cities with populations under

50,000.

"We

handle a lot of calls and we do a lot of programs

that other agencies have dropped," Murray

noted.

The

reaccreditation certificate will be presented to

the City Council sometime in September. Later, a

public reception will mark the occasion, Murray

said.

"It's

a very prestigious honor," he said.