Chapter Blue
Tyra Valeriano, host of Chapter Blue, comes with 11 years of law enforcement experience and talks about mental health, self-care, work-life balance and more. Through honest conversations and personal experience, Chapter Blue allows for officers worldwide to share their stories, struggles, and successes both on and off duty and to give the public an insight to what the media has made into such a controversial profession. The podcast will establish the connection to the important topics and struggles in law enforcement and open up to all first responder roles in the new year to address how interchangeable the roles relate to the struggle. Join the conversation, because it’s long overdue!
Chapter Blue
Leadership Lessons from Law Enforcement with Adam Romine
What if transitioning from a high-stress career could lead to a more balanced and fulfilling life? In our latest Chapter Blue episode, retired Colorado Springs police officer Adam Romine shares his journey from the frontline of law enforcement to a role in security management. Adam offers a glimpse into the lifestyle changes that come with trading the unpredictable nature of police work for a structured corporate environment, emphasizing the importance of relationship-building over enforcement. He also discusses his ongoing connection to the law enforcement community as a reserve officer, which allows him to stay engaged in meaningful ways, like participating in school visits and community events.
Navigating the shift to civilian life poses unique challenges, especially for those accustomed to the intense environment of law enforcement. Adam opens up about the adjustment period needed to acclimate to the corporate world, where the stakes and the culture differ vastly from what former officers are used to. He stresses the significance of nurturing a diverse social network to ease this transition and sheds light on the impact of law enforcement culture on social interactions outside the force. We discussed how maintaining a balanced life and prioritizing mental health can significantly influence one's well-being during this period of change.
Family and mental health are at the forefront of our conversation as Adam reflects on balancing his career with parenting older children and young twins. We talk about the unrealistic glamorization of parenting while serving as a law enforcement officer and the often overlooked sacrifices made. Our dialogue extends to the pressures of media scrutiny in policing and the essential role of leadership in supporting officers. Adam shares his perspective into leadership challenges within the police force, the importance of emotional intelligence, and offers advice to new officers on maintaining a grounded approach while extending grace to fellow team members. Tune in for an honest discussion of life behind the badge and beyond, packed with lessons for officers, families, and anyone intrigued by the world of law enforcement.
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Welcome to Chapter Blue, the podcast where we discuss the world of law enforcement through an honest conversation on tough or controversial topics, real stories, perspectives and experience from officers all around the world. Whether you're here for insights on mental health, self-care, work-life balance, getting into law enforcement, getting out of law enforcement, or just trying to learn about personal and professional challenges officers face every day, you've come to the right place. I'm your host, tyra Valeriano, and whether I'm going solo or speaking with a guest, each episode will discuss different aspects of life behind the badge. Let's turn the page and step into Chapter Blue. Welcome back to Chapter Blue. I want to jump into today's podcast by welcoming my next guest, adam Romine. He is retired out of Colorado Springs. I want to give him the opportunity to introduce himself, his law enforcement background as well as what he's doing today. So go ahead, adam.
Adam Romine:I was a police officer. Well, I guess I'm still a reserve police officer, been in law enforcement for 24 years, retired from the Colorado Springs Police Department a few years ago. While I was there, I got to do a lot of fun things. I was a Homeland Security Task Force signed to the Bomb Squad. I was a training sergeant Probably one of the most fun jobs I think you can have as a cop for sure. Um, after I retired, I did some DOD contracting for a little while, but currently I'm running security for uh Denver Metro, uh city, so for all their city facilities. Um, just a lot of program management in terms of uh security and security personnel.
Tyra Valeriano:Sounds like an interesting change. How different is it from law enforcement?
Adam Romine:Yeah, I'll tell you. One is the schedule, which is nice. It's not shift work, which is fantastic. I still get to work 410s, which is amazing, but I don't have to wear a vest, I'm not required to have a gun. I have a desk job, which I thought I would hate, but as I got older and my body got more beat up, I don't hate as much as I used to, you know.
Adam Romine:So, in terms of law enforcement, I think that the biggest, biggest thing to wrap your brain around is that you're you're not the police anymore. When you go into the security and corporate security side of things. Obviously, still, the goal is to ensure safety of personnel and guests and things like that, but I don't have to enforce anything but rules now, and a lot of that is just compliance and making friends with people and trying to get them to. Well, I guess that's like being a cop. Anyway, like you know, you use your words and try to get people to comply, as opposed to having to use force to get people to comply. It's always worked out better for you and everybody else. So, yeah, it's a lot better for you.
Adam Romine:Yeah, for sure. Um, you know, and in today's world in law enforcement, it's really important you know to do it that way. So, um, yeah, overall it's been a been a great switch. Like I said, I'm still a reserve cop, which is nice because you still have, I mean, you know this like once you bleed blue, you can't stop, you'll have that in your blood forever. So I still get that camaraderie piece and I just get to do a lot of the fun events now. So you know trunk or treats and I'll go to the schools and read books and you know all the things that, like as a cop, you never really thought about doing and now I realize how important and how much fun they are. I just get to do them now.
Tyra Valeriano:Very nice. So what's your schedule like as a reserve officer?
Adam Romine:I just do two shifts a month, you know, kind of, and the beauty of that is I can kind of base it around. You know what, what life's thrown at me. My wife's still a police officer. She's in investigations now, so that that works out well. But we also have one-year-old twins. So you know that that creates a lot, of, a lot of chaos, like in terms of schedules. So it's pretty flexible, it's. It's two shifts a month minimum. You know, if I want them to work more, I can. We do a lot of stuff because it's Denver Metro, we still work with DPD doing Broncos games and you know Taylor Swift concerts and all the things, and we're right next to Red Rocks Amphitheater. So we have all that, that stuff to do. So, yeah, pretty, pretty laid back in terms of police work. Very nice. How long have you been married, if you don't mind me asking? So I, this is a second marriage for me. I was married before. I have two older kids, but I've been with my current wife for four years.
Tyra Valeriano:Okay, and your older kids? How old are they?
Adam Romine:My older kids are 21 and 19.
Adam Romine:So I literally started all the way over again, which actually brings a lot of, a lot of um, you know I I apologize to my son, he's 19. I said, you know, I wish I knew then what I know now, like I would have been a much better dad the first time. Um, you know, I tell people it's not often in life that you get a do-over, and not that you want, I necessarily wanted a do-over, but I kind of got one. And so all those lessons learned from the first time. You know, when you go through things with your kids and you learn what to worry about and what not to worry about, you know, I find myself just laughing at my boys a lot now, just enjoying like the goofy things that they do. You know, we're remodeling a house right now. It finished framing their bedroom and they have closets right next to each other and they're playing peekaboo between the closets with each other. So just things like that. I'm just enjoying the heck out of.
Tyra Valeriano:You know it's funny that you said that, because I 100% can relate to what you're saying. I have my oldest son is actually going to be 18 in a couple of weeks and I have a 15-year-old and that's from a previous marriage. Before I was a police officer and now I have a nine-year-old. But when I started with him it was almost like a start over because I was able to enjoy all of the time that I didn't get to enjoy with my older kids and it really is different. I mean, it makes you feel bad because you wish you would have known, but how could you have known? And it really just puts it into perspective how much you missed out on or how much you wish you would have known to enjoy your kids when they were little.
Adam Romine:Yeah, and you know I it was pretty when I took this position that I'm in now I told him. I said you've got to know, like my family's always going to be number one. I worked a lot when and I was on call a lot when my kids older kids were young, and I just don't want that anymore for them. Like I have zero intention of missing anything. I didn't miss a single appointment while my wife was pregnant. I've made it to every like doctor's appointment that they have. Like I'm just not going to miss anything now, I just want to enjoy it.
Tyra Valeriano:What is your perspective that you've been able to take in now that you aren't in law enforcement, with a schedule and fully employed with the family aspect of what you missed out on during law enforcement versus now?
Adam Romine:You know, I think and I don't know if it's a perspective thing, I think you know, as, as a police officer, you spend so much time in a world full of full of bad right, I mean, nobody calls you on a good day when you're a cop. You're always going to something that that you know that just isn't going well for somebody. And then we also had to deal with, you know, just not always very good people, and so I think the thing I am bringing to it now is just realizing that how full of good people the world is. You know, I get to see them now, I get to interact with them. And you know, as a cop, I mean all your other cops, all good people, but we have weird coping mechanisms, you know, to exist inside of that really bad world. And so now the people that I work with, nobody has to do that. So we all, you can joke about regular things. You don't have to make light of terrible things, you know, just to try and get by.
Adam Romine:So, and I think that probably then bleeds over to my, to my family life and my time with my kids. And you know my, my son, is in the Navy and he's in Oklahoma, but I mean, still I find myself just texting him all the time. Um, you know, hey, just want to let you know I'm thinking about you, just things like that. I think I just it's bled over to my life. Um, my, you know my home life a lot more.
Tyra Valeriano:Nice. Um, I want to ask you if you struggled at all with maybe not so much your nervous system, but the stress side of things. When you got out, did you feel that you just constantly needed to be stressing about something, or did that kind of just go away? When you got out of law enforcement, did it feel like you were just relieved of the weight on your shoulders?
Adam Romine:No, I, you know I was involved in, you know, in Colorado Springs we had had some big incidents here, um, and I don't think you realize, and then when you're on call for years and years, you don't really know how to turn off, Um, and I I'm telling guys too now that are getting out of out of law enforcement I'm like, give yourself probably 12 to 18 months before you'll actually feel relaxed. You know it. Just, you don't know how to not be always turned on. You know and ready for things. But I even think that too, and I remember I had a conversation several years ago.
Adam Romine:You know just the way law enforcement changed. You know, and we all hated it as young cops taking, you know, like a car that was broken into overnight with no suspect information and you had to go take a report on it, and you know, and you're sitting there in the dark trying to do your report, but I don't think we realized at the time what a great thing that was in terms of like cortisol, like, uh, your body's ability to kind of regulate things, um, and I say this too, like being a training sergeant, like we take these young people, we send them to the academy for a long time. We do stress, inoculation and, um, you know RBT training and all this kind of stuff. Then we put you on the street and, you know, cops, we basically shoot them out of a cannon for 10 hours. We launch them in the air and say go.
Adam Romine:You know, cops, we basically shoot them out of a cannon for 10 hours. We launch them in the air and say go, because all we do is go to in progress person's calls, like they don't get the downtime to take a cold report with no suspect information, just to document something you know. So all we've done is shoot their, their stress level through the ceiling and we keep them like that almost all the time. So we don't know what that's going to do, you know, in 20, 30 years to their bodies versus, you know. So it's a kind of a weird mix. Like you know, 34 years ago we weren't overly healthy, you know, in the law enforcement family. Like you know, the idea of eating well and trying to sleep and working out and all those things wasn't so much of a thing, you know. But we also had the downtime in our work. Now they're much healthier in terms of lifestyle, but they don't have the downtime at work. So how's that going to balance? I don't know.
Tyra Valeriano:Right. So I want to go back to the whole friend idea. The reason why I asked you about I don't know if it's the nervous system, but cortisol is a pretty good example is because when I got out I felt that I couldn't connect with people because obviously I moved to the other side of the world. So I had to make friends and I was having trouble making friends because, just like you said, you can't relate to people who are outside if you don't really have that kind of connection with people outside of law enforcement. So I would be talking about things that were related to the job. Nobody can relate to me.
Tyra Valeriano:I felt like nobody understood the jokes that I thought were funny still funny to me were not funny to everyone else. But then there was this stress factor of I just was looking to stress out for nothing. It's almost like I wanted that. I couldn't help but feel like I wanted that and I'm living in paradise and there's literally nothing to worry about, but yet I'm wanting that and I just could not help that feeling and I want to say now it's gotten a lot better. But that is something that a lot of people don't realize that they're going to face when they get out of law enforcement. So I was curious if you experienced that.
Adam Romine:I got really good advice as a young cop from a family friend of ours who had been a cop for a long time and he told me. He said, you know, cops would tend to only hang out with them, with themselves, outside of work too. You know, he said so do yourself a favor and don't just surround yourself with the police all the time, because then that's all you know, it's all you talk about. It's so I was very intentional about I had, you know, a group, a group of friends for sure, that were police, but we were pretty intentional about outside of work, not talking about work, talking about your family, talking about sports, whatever it was. And so then a lot of my rest of my friend group wasn't necessarily the police, it was, you know, people from my gym and things like that. So when I left law enforcement I wasn't just without the police friend group, without the ability to have those jokes and things like that.
Adam Romine:Now I'll tell you the corporate world, their sense of humor is entirely different than law enforcement and you'll hurt everybody's feelings. I figured that out really quickly and so I've gotten better at that. But you know, you do still seek that a little bit, especially, you know, if you do it long enough. You know I would think anybody that does it more than five years probably has that kind of embedded in their DNA where I don't want to see you seek stress, but I don't know. You just anticipate always something's going to happen and so you're always looking around and it's hard to really kind of relax, um. But that's why I say you know, 12 to 18 months away from it, full time, I think gives you a little bit more perspective and the longer you go, obviously, the better you get at realizing. It's kind of like not not everybody in the world is bad. Not something bad is always going to happen either.
Tyra Valeriano:You know, you're gonna.
Adam Romine:you can just go sit at the beach and enjoy yourself. Um, you know, I I think that's interesting too for me is I talked to um, like some of the people I work with and they go on vacation, they like to have, you know, they want to go and do and and and do, and they have their schedule and I got to do all these things, whereas, you know, my like, my wife and I, we like to go and just sit down and not do anything. You know, and I think that's because you know you spend so much time, and all of us, and just go, go, go, go, go, so to unplug and do it. Well, it's nice just to sit down with a book and some music and that's all you got to worry about.
Tyra Valeriano:Right? Um, how do you and your wife manage home work-life balance with two little ones? How is that for you guys?
Adam Romine:I mean, I'm not going to lie, it definitely is.
Adam Romine:Uh, you got to hit a sweet spot in the schedule. So, um, you know, for us, we, because we work tens, we kind of offset um, you know, I take Friday, or I take Friday, saturday, Sunday off. She has Saturday, sunday, monday off, so then we don't need childcare on Mondays or Fridays, which definitely helps, um. But then Tuesday through Thursday one of us goes to work early, like we're there at 5. Um, that way we can get off at three and pick the boys up, and then the other one drops them off at daycare and then gets home a little later. So you know again, fortunately, you know, the investigative unit she's in doesn't require that she be on call, which helps a ton If I say that she's also going to have surgery coming up in December. So then I get to do like a full-time dad thing, cause she won't be able to pick the boys up, she can't do any of that stuff. So ask me again in a month and I'll tell you the schedule is probably ridiculous right now.
Adam Romine:I think we've found a good balance.
Tyra Valeriano:That's good, and what have you kind of learned in terms of now with your two little ones versus your older kids when they were smaller? How is the schedule for you now, since you were in law? I'm assuming you were in law enforcement at that time right, never knew the difference.
Adam Romine:That was just what I was. Um, you know, I I think I before I was not, like I said, I wasn't as intentional about trying to make sure I was at things. Um, you know, I was very career focused and trying to, you know, check all the boxes and set yourself up for promotion, all the things you have to do, Um, you know. So there's that piece of it is that perspective definitely makes a difference. But, again, like I was on call all the time. So you know, like, the idea of making sure I was at practice in the evenings and things like that wasn't always a guarantee. You know, you try when you can, but you know, just, it was a different game back then.
Adam Romine:You know, also, to their mom didn't work, which made a difference in terms of how do you balance the schedule out. She could get them where they needed to be and all that kind of stuff, you know. But I also remember being on call with with guys and there was a call out and they were out to dinner and they'd leave and have to call friends to come pick them up from a restaurant. So you know, I've I've lived that life and you know that's just unfortunate. You know, when I look back at that I'm like just what a terrible way to kind of go through life and putting your family second that way. And I don't want to. I'm not trying to demean anybody, I mean, you know, everybody has different priorities. I just look at it now and think, man, like in 20 years or 30 years, when you don't have that job anymore, you still have your family, you know.
Tyra Valeriano:so make sure you have that relationship or those relationships set up for success going forward. I like to bring up this topic and this is actually something I talked about on my first episode was being a parent in law enforcement and the realities of how difficult it can be, because I think we glamorize and I'm not saying that everybody does this, but I think it's glamorized to say, hey, you can do it, encourage you to be a police officer, you can get through the academy and you can be super cool dad or super mom, and there's just this pretty picture. That isn't real. It's not a realistic perspective of what you're going to experience as a parent in law enforcement. So everybody knows what they're signing up for, they know they're going to miss holidays, birthdays, all of these things, but the real struggle is how do you deal with that and how do you make time for your family, how do you make time for your kids and when do we learn these lessons?
Tyra Valeriano:I kind of feel that now that we have this at the forefront in law enforcement, we're dealing with mental health issues and people wanting work-life balance more as they go into their career. Are we going to fix that? How is law enforcement going to change that? So I was just curious to see how you were able to see the difference between your older kids compared to now, because this is a conversation that's being had now. Right, we're trying to figure out how can officers have work-life balance considering the circumstances that they're facing today.
Adam Romine:Yeah, and it's interesting. You know you brought up like missing the holidays and birthdays and all that kind of stuff. But I mean, obviously if you missed every Christmas, like that would be remembered. But you know you're going to look back and you or your kids are probably going to look back and not remember a specific day. They're going to remember patterns, um, you know, and what you were like in the evenings and that kind of stuff. And I always think that too, like I mean, you can give the greatest gifts, but your kids, when they're older, will remember, you know, vacations and camping trips and experiences, you know. And so I I I think about that more than anything with my older kids versus now is how much more engaged I am, I think, with my, with my boys when I'm home, like after work and on weekends and things like that.
Adam Romine:With my boys when I'm home, like after working, on weekends and things like that, um, you know, versus when my older kids were like, and you know, like it's mentally draining a lot of times, you know, and I investigated the child exploitation for a long time, which like can just suck the life out of you and you know. So then when you get home, like you do want to just stare at a TV and like have, do something mindless, you know, and have and have a time out, so which then takes away the engagement from your, from your family. So you know, I think you brought up the mental health thing. I think that's a big piece that we're recognizing as a society now is the toll that that can take on you if you don't, if, if you're not proactive about it. Um, you know, and that doesn't mean you know, everybody wants to go see a therapist. You know, twice a year, though I encourage it, like I don't think you realize the emotional vomiting sometimes you need to do until you get in the room and and just get it out.
Adam Romine:Um, but being, I think, if nothing else, intentional with your time and not just going, especially I say this for young men don't just go home and play video games, you know, especially violent video games, because then you're really never giving your mind a break.
Adam Romine:I'm remodeling a house Like there's something creative and framing and drywall and pain and laying floors, and like so I, even if it's something like that, like find something you know, and for me, like I it's, I say like it's not helpful having one-year-olds in there while you're trying to lay floors down, on the other hand, like it's time with them, you know, and I still get to accomplish something, you know, but it has nothing to do with work and I can just laugh and have fun and that kind of stuff. So it's therapeutic without seeing a therapist. So I think we're much, much better at you know, in law enforcement now, about recognizing that that is a huge piece. You know that that post-traumatic stress whether you want to call it PTSD, I don't know, but it I think you'd be foolish not to recognize that a lot of what you do has that stress and that trauma involved in what it does to you later. So be intentional for sure.
Tyra Valeriano:So would you say that you're a pretty big advocate for having hobbies that aren't related to work?
Adam Romine:Yeah, well, and it's hard to say. I mean, I think there's a lot to be said for having hobbies that have nothing to do with work. That being said, um, you know, like you've got to if, if going shooting is like a de-stressor for you and you can just kind of go out there and think about that little three inch dot that's, you know, 50 yards out there, if that's what's like brings you back down, go for it. If you don't, even if it's if it's work, I guess you could articulate that shootings work related. But it's better than not having anything.
Adam Romine:You know, I was a CrossFit instructor for a long time and you know, I remember runners coming in and I was, you know, and they're like oh, I need to get stronger. For for this reason, and at some point I'm like like exercise is exercise, whatever gets you out the door and off the chair, whether it's lifting weights or going running or whatever, like it's better to do something than nothing. So if your hobby happens to be shooting and that's what gives you a stress relief, great, um, I think there's something to be said for having something nothing work related. That way you can completely separate it. You know, but to each his own, I suppose you know. Maybe it's music or playing chess or, like I love to cook. That's probably a one for me that I really enjoy. But you got to try some new things to figure out what your hobby could or might be.
Tyra Valeriano:Right. What do you think is the major cause for the mental health crisis that law enforcement is facing right now? I mean, there's obviously so many factors right where we know we've been in the job, we know there's a lot of factors, but over and over, I keep seeing the question what is it? Is it really the traumatic experiences that we're seeing? Is that really what's causing it? Or is it, you know, the job and the stress that's affecting the home life, that making people feel some type of way? What do you think is a main factor in what the mental health struggle is with police officers?
Adam Romine:I think a big piece of it now is the microscope. I think a big piece of it now is the microscope. You know, we had the ability before, like to make mistakes and learn from them like with your peers or your bosses or something like that and move forward and just use that as a learning lesson. Now I mean and don't get me wrong I think body cameras are probably one of the best inventions ever in law enforcement. But everything now goes to the media and then the media gets to paint their own picture and then that becomes society's reality, and so you don't have the ability to just make a mistake and learn anymore. And so I think, aside from just that work stress is if I screw something up, the whole world is going to see it and you think about like man, they like. It leaves no room for error.
Adam Romine:It leaves no room to be a human you know, and no other job, I mean hell, even like surgeons have a very particular you know thing that they have to do in which people could die at any minute, but they don't broadcast that to the world like they do in law enforcement. So even then they have the ability to make a mistake and correct it and move forward and really nobody else would know. So I think that is probably one of the bigger things that nobody wants to talk about is how that media scrutiny and being in the spotlight all the time is really messing with people and it takes away your ability to be a person.
Tyra Valeriano:I feel like when I was in law enforcement, let's say, for example, I had a case where my body camera was spewed all over the internet and of course there's just nobody's going to ever see what's outside of that one facing part. Right, you can be saying whatever you're saying about the case or the scene, but nobody's going to see what's happening around you. They're going to hear what you're saying and once that gets out there and people develop their opinion about what you're doing, how you're doing your job. They don't know the law. They don't understand the law.
Tyra Valeriano:You know you're feeling like you did something wrong. So not only is it that you are messing up and everybody's going to see it, even when you're not messing up, and you're feeling like you did because now everybody has an opinion and you can't say anything. You're not allowed to go out there in public and say, hey, this is why I did what I did. This is the law, and you know, put it out there and give your side. Did you have that struggle where you weren't allowed to say your piece because we're just not allowed to say anything about it?
Adam Romine:Yeah, I mean it's pretty odd and it's been made clear that you know you're not supposed to give your opinions like to media and things like that. Obviously you can share it with people, that you know, but you also don't want to, you know, go down the troll hole on social media and be reading people's comments, because then it just fires you up even more. You know, I think what really, what cops are looking for is leadership staff that will be their champion, you know, and they'll stand, and we see examples of it around the country where, you know chiefs or mayors or whatever get in front of the cameras and say, hey, enough of the nonsense, here's what really happened. Um, and a hundred percent, believe my, my officers did the right thing. Um, you know. But you know again, like you talked about, like all the world sees is what they see in that little tiny lens.
Adam Romine:not, you know, what led up to it, not what you're hearing in the background, the history of those people, um, you know any interactions you'd had with them before or similar types of situation, all that kind of stuff. And it's interesting, like I remember I was in a shooting in 2019 and we had had body cameras for a few years, but they never they it was a department policy at the time that you weren't allowed to watch the camera footage, even like after your interview was done and all that kind of stuff. And then I had my shooting and after my interview was over, they finally changed that. That the uh investigation sergeant said hey, um, just want to let you know. You're the first one Like, we've got this in place. Now that your interview is done, you can come watch your video if you want, you know, from the body camera in place. Now that your interview is done, you can come watch your video, if you want, you know, from the body camera.
Adam Romine:And I didn't do it and he was mad Um, he's like man, I spent so much time trying to get this in place, but what I didn't want was to second guess myself the next time because maybe I saw something different on the video. Like I knew what my reality was when I was there and I knew all the things that led up to, you know, do that shooting and I didn't want to watch a video of it and think, oh damn it, like how did I not see that? And then I find myself in that situation again next time and I and I wait too long to make a decision. You know that cost me my life or somebody else their life, my life or somebody else's life. So you know, that's why I didn't go into the world of watching the video and basing everything based on just what's on that video.
Tyra Valeriano:So when that policy was in place, was it accessible for public record? Was the media able to request it, or how did that work for your agency?
Adam Romine:Yeah, so we really, at the time, were not releasing any body cam video. I mean, they could do. They call it a CORA request it's a Colorado Open Records Act but they would have to. Whoever was requesting would have to show the reason why they needed the video, why it was in the public's interest or something like that. But if it was still going, there's potential for it to go to court or whatever like that. It's still evidence, so they wouldn't release it.
Adam Romine:We release a lot more camera footage now. They're proactive about it and I think it's the right thing to do. You know, I've said this for years. Like you know, we preach about, you know, being open to the public, but we weren't always very open with our employees. You know our employees were finding out about things on the news and you're like you know, why didn't they tell us before they told the world?
Adam Romine:Um, so they're getting a lot better now, I think, in general about one being open to your employees and they hey, here's what's going on, this is going to go out to the media. So if you get questions, you kind of see it coming. But, um, you know, also with the camera footage, I'm glad that they released the footage. I also just wish there was a message along with it other than the very factual um, you know, and then this happened, and then this happened, and then this happened. Like let's get out in front of it and say, hey, you know, our guys did a great job. Here's what they dealt with. This is what we train. This is how they responded.
Tyra Valeriano:I have seen it now, more now than ever, where leaders are coming out and they're making these press conferences for their officers, but in a lot of times I still I see videos circulating on the internet and I'm wondering where is the leadership that's going to back up their officer? Because a lot of the times the officers in the right, of course, they're in the wrong sometimes too. But even with that, you can go out there and tell the public hey, you know, we acknowledge this mistake and this is what we're doing. The transparency has to work both ways, because if you're just putting that video out there and saying, hey, public, you can see everything we're doing, but yet they still don't understand what we're doing. It's not doing any justice for the officer or the agency.
Adam Romine:And I think you know, if we are going to take a lesson from politics is try and control the narrative. You know, I mean you see it like at the, at the national level. You know if there's something coming up, they try to get out in front of it and say here, here's what happened, here's what's happening and this is why. So I think that's probably our next step. I think in law enforcement we need leaders who will try and get out and control the narrative.
Adam Romine:You know, again, sometimes you have one that just is not afraid of of the politics and what people think, and all that kind of stuff. They're department's champion, and I think you're going to have passionate, dedicated employees when you have those kinds of leaders. The departments where you don't have that are the ones people leave. And so I think leaders have to ask themselves that that question too is what's more important to me, Like how, what, what is going to allow me to sleep at night? Am I a champion for my officers when they're in the right, or am I going to play the politics?
Tyra Valeriano:Yeah, and in your experience, what would you say? You've seen change in leadership over the last maybe five years.
Adam Romine:I mean I don't see leadership going in a good direction as a general rule in law enforcement. I think it's very much the PC world that we live in that they did, rather than, you know, accidentally saying something that is going to make somebody upset. They just don't say anything at all. So that's why I think when you see one stand up and make a statement in front of a camera, it's such an anomaly because it doesn't happen.
Adam Romine:We are promoting people who are managers and not leaders, and I think in like a military, paramilitary types of organization, like you need leaders I'm not saying you don't need managers and maybe you can teach leaders to manage, but you can't necessarily teach managers to lead.
Adam Romine:So I you know somewhere in that, in that testing process, we've lost the ability to identify those characteristics that you can't, that are harder to test. For you know, we can do policy review and we can say you know, do you know this statute better than the next guy? Okay, you're up, but how do we get people to follow you? You know, how do you create that followership? So I don't know, and I'm not, the good old boy club was not necessarily the way to do it either, you know, because then we were promoting people just out of friendship, I think some type of personal involvement in that and saying, oh, like this person deserves to get promoted because of these key things that that are needed as opposed to just doing it all by computer. And what is? What is the number of crunch, say, at the end.
Tyra Valeriano:I agree with everything that you're saying. I also think that, with the way things are in policing, it's very hard to adjust leadership where it's at right now because we have fallen so far behind. So, for example, I probably can count on all of my fingers how many agencies have newer officers than experienced officers. So not only are they dealing with the fact that they don't have experience in their agency, but they're promoting these people to be leaders. So maybe they have some leader characteristics, but they're not prepared with the experience to be in a leadership position.
Adam Romine:If you want to be a sergeant, like you have to have a minimum of, let's say, eight years in law enforcement before you can test. Because you know, I I've always thought this about like cops too. Like you're one and two or maybe even one year one, you don't know anything. You realize that, you're trying to figure it out. You're like two through five. You think you're hot and you know everything, you can do everything, and you're the man after year five. You're like no, you know what, I've got a lot to learn still. So you're five to 10. I think you really hone your craft and you learn a lot. And then 10 to 20 is like your sweet spot, where you have a ton of knowledge, ton of experience and you're really still passionate about working. After 20, you start seeing the backside of things and retirement and all that kind of stuff. But, um, you know. So I don't know that you can like speed it up per se, but I think you know we talk a lot about emotional intelligence for young officers, like when we're in hiring.
Adam Romine:I think it wouldn't be a bad thing for law enforcement leadership to stop and do some self-reflection and think, okay, you know, where am I missing the mark and improve themselves and then people are going to come with them. You know, I had a commander he's a chief now but um, he, he struggled, um he like we were in patrol at the time his division was the last one that built literally midnight shifts filled everywhere else in the city and he still had day shift spots open during shift picks. And so you know, I remember, after the year started he sat down with me and one of the other sergeants. He goes like what happened, like what created this problem, and he wanted honest feedback. We gave him honest feedback and, to his credit, he made legitimate, great changes as a leader, you know.
Adam Romine:So I think maybe that's what we need is some internal self reflection and figuring out. What do I need to do? You know, we can give signing bonuses, we can do all these things like to try and attract people. How do we keep people and how do we create that followership? And that starts at that leadership level.
Tyra Valeriano:So not a lot of people are a fan of hiring from outside the agency for leadership roles. But, just like I had asked you before, considering the circumstances that we're facing today, do you think that it's more reasonable to consider people who do have that leadership experience to come from outside into an agency, or do you still feel like it should all be done within the agency?
Adam Romine:Yeah, I think it probably depends on the dynamics of the agency. You know so, like my department, you know it's close to 800 cops, like it's a pretty big agency. It's not hard to identify good leaders in a group that size. You know, um, the department where I'm a reserve is a department of eight. You know so when you try to do promotions inside of the department at eight, all of a sudden your, your pool is a lot more limited.
Adam Romine:So would it be beneficial for a department like that to say, hey, like I really need, like a strong Lieutenant to help me. You know, if I'm the chief and I want to go to, let's say, um, you know, the FBI national Academy, who do I leave in charge of this department? And maybe you don't have that person, um, on your in your agency, so you have to. So I think it probably. I don't think you can say, you know, definitely go outside or definitely don't. Probably depends on the dynamics. You know again, the more people you have to choose from, the more likely you are to have those resources and those types of people available. You know, but maybe not, I don't know. It just kind of depends.
Tyra Valeriano:I feel like that's another reason why there's such a problem with the mental health aspect is just because your leaders that are there now just don't know what to do. They don't know how to help the officers, the resources are very limited and just all the chaos that's going on within agencies. Now you know you have a lieutenant that may have maybe four or five years experience on the street maybe not even on the street, just total law enforcement experience and they're in this role and you know people are having real dilemmas on patrol and they're having real struggles, you know, with their career or their life, and you have this person in charge that just doesn't know what the heck is going on.
Adam Romine:Yeah, and they're at least proactive in saying, hey, we like this is something we need to address as the mental health side of things. But you have a huge group of police leaders who never policed in a in a world, like our young cops do now with the media scrutiny, with the body cameras, with, like the going only toprogress calls and I say this from like a larger agency but you know they never policed in that world. So how can you it's really hard then to relate to a young cop who is dealing with these problems that you never dealt with before personally. So, yeah, that's, I don't know how you fix that either the other than to say, hey, um, everybody at staff level, everybody gets to start working some patrol shifts and see what this world's like for these guys, so that then you can help them address these problems or at least better understand where they're coming from.
Tyra Valeriano:Right, all right. Well, we are running out of time. There is a question that I want to ask you. I ask all of my guests, and that is what would, what advice would you give your rookie self, if there was any advice to give?
Adam Romine:Um, I, I would give the same advice that I got from the officer that I knew growing up and it's the same one that I gave to every cop that I trained Um, and all of them that, like, when I was the sergeant in charge of it is have a life outside of this job. Like, don't let it define you. We're very fortunate that we found a career that we're passionate about and can truly make a difference, but you can't let it define you. Like, if you're a dad and a husband, be a dad and a husband who's also a police officer. Don't be a police officer who's also a dad and a husband.
Adam Romine:So I think that would be the advice I give is just, you know, really focus on like, figuring out early what your priorities are and have a life outside of this, this role you know we always talk about. Keep your head on a swivel and be aware of your surroundings and things like that, but don't forget to have fun. You know, I I started all my my lineups that way. Like you know, at the end of briefing, before we go out for the day, the last thing I told everybody is like, let's go have some fun. So don't be afraid to stop and enjoy things where you can, and for the public in general. Like these guys are all human, they're going to make mistakes. Give them some grace. Let them learn they're going to be better for it and then for that you're going to get a better police officer.
Tyra Valeriano:Yeah, that's great advice. I appreciate that and I'm pretty sure that a lot of the listeners can resonate with that. Adam, thank you so much for your time. I appreciate you signing up with me and us doing this podcast together. You have a lot of experience and knowledge and I think that a lot of people will benefit from some of the perspectives that you shared today.
Tyra Valeriano:If you guys have any questions about today's podcast, you can reach out to me. Adam is not available for any kind of contact, but I'm sure if you guys have any questions, I can pass them over to him and he'd happily be able to answer those for you guys. But until then, everybody, stay safe and we'll see you on the next one. Thank you for joining me on Chapter Blue. If you enjoyed today's episode, be sure to follow and tag me on social media and share with your friends and fellow officers. If you're interested in joining an episode, I'd love for you to be a part of the conversation. Until next time, stay safe, take care of yourself and remember you're never alone in this journey.