COMMUNITY POLICING EVOLVING PARKS WRITES IN REPORT TO PANEL.

Byline: Deborah Sullivan Staff Writer

After being criticized for reassigning community liaison officers to regular patrol duties, Los Angeles Police Chief Bernard C. Parks offered his vision of community policing to a city panel Tuesday as part of an upcoming debate on the issue.

While some residents and Neighborhood Watch leaders have complained that they've lost their personal contacts in the department, Parks said the change puts all officers on the front lines of community policing.

``It's an evolving process, but it really hasn't changed,'' Parks said in a written report submitted to the City Council's Public Safety Committee.

Community policing, a key to LAPD reform after the Rodney King beating, become a source of controversy after Parks removed senior lead officers from their role as full-time community liaisons and put them back in squad cars.

Councilwoman Laura Chick, who heads the Public Safety Committee, has scheduled a hearing on the issue for July 12.

``I think there's been a lot of confusion, a lot of ambivalence, among the public,'' Chick said. ``What is community policing? It has been experienced by the public very much in the past through the senior lead officer. Now that has been changed by Chief Parks. This is his opportunity to come to Public Safety to share his vision of community policing for the new millennium.''

In his report to the committee, Parks said his philosophy is based on involving all LAPD officers - from new recruits to himself - in community policing, fostering partnerships between the communities and police officers, adopting a problem-solving approach to community problems in which officers tackle the root causes of crime, and placing officers in the same area as much as possible to develop trust and understanding between police and the public.

Commissioner Warren T. Jackson pointed out that the redeployment of senior lead officers is open to review, and can be reversed if it isn't working.

``While we think this is the right course, we agreed to reevaluate it,'' Jackson said.