Congressman Visits St. Cloud COP House, Proposes Bill To Take Concept Nationwide

(KNSI) – A U.S. Congressman was in St. Cloud to tour what’s being called a model of community policing. On Wednesday, sixth District Congressman Tom Emmer was at the St. Cloud Rotary Club Community OutPost, also called the COP House.

In March, Emmer proposed the Community OutPost Outreach and Engagement Act to help guide other cities across the country to build Community OutPosts.

Jake Judd (KNSI News)

“This is a pilot program that we’re trying to push because we want other communities to do this. That playbook. We’ll share with our colleagues, policymakers and say, look, you got to have a plan. This isn’t just a concept. This is actually something that has been done and it’s been highly successful.”

The bill would include the playbook for how the Community OutPost established private partnerships to get funded and built. The other part of the blueprints would consist of instructions on how to provide programming. In St. Cloud, the community OutPost has English language programs, back-to-school events, dental and breastfeeding clinics, legal office hours, kids’ activities, and improving police-community relations. The COP House also sponsors five youth sports leagues, including basketball, soccer, hockey, fishing, and golf.

Emmer says the programs offered at the Community OutPost are similar to reforms activists say they want in policing.

“This I think is a huge part of the answer. Solutions like the cop house with community engagement, putting peace officers and citizens together where they live in building a relationship. That is a big part of the answer.”

Emmer says he will tell his colleagues in Washington D.C. that the Community OutPost in St. Cloud is working and can help rebuild trust between people and police.

Jake Judd (KNSI News)

“You can have these hyper partisan political debates or we can start to sit down and talk about how we literally rebuild our confidence in the system, not just the community, but in our peace officers.”

Emmer says the COP House should be celebrated. St. Cloud officials say they’re looking at building another Community OutPost in the future.

St. Cloud’s Community Outpost was established in 2017 and is modeled after a similar program in Racine, Wisconsin. The COP House is the first of its kind in Minnesota. In 2018, the COP House was honored with the Department of Justice’s L. Anthony Sutin Civic Imagination Award.

The effort was a partnership between the St. Cloud Police Department, Mayo Ambulance, CentraCare Health, St. Cloud Rotary, and Stearns County Social Services.

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