University of Utah Police pledge to increase number of women on force
Jul 26, 2021, 4:22 PM | Updated: Dec 29, 2022, 12:09 pm
FILE -- Police and security services emblems are pictured at the University of Utah in Salt Lake City on Friday, April 16, 2021. Laura Seitz, Deseret News
SALT LAKE CITY– The Police Department at the University of Utah wants to increase the number of women serving on their police force to 30%.
University police are joining the 30-by-30 initiative, a national coalition with the goal to increase women and their representation in policing across the country.
“Having a diverse agency is essential to us and is an important part of reforming policing,” acting chief of University Police Jason Hinojosa said.
Currently, 10% of people working on the University of Utah police force are women, and 33% are in the command staff, according to the university. That’s a little less than the national average of 12%.
#DidYouKnow this month @uofupolice joined a coalition of policing leaders and experts through the @30x30Initiative. We made our pledge to increase the number of women recruits to 30% by 2030.#UofU #Safety pic.twitter.com/Xr7ZDIIzI0
— University of Utah Police (@UofUPolice) July 20, 2021
“We want to promote all kinds of diversity, including gender representation among our staff and leadership to continue building better outcomes and interactions with our community,” added Hinojosa. “We will use this program and best practices shared by partners to develop further initiatives that address barriers to women’s advancement in our field.”
They say for the next six months, U police will focus on collecting a baseline of officer’s concerns and priorities within the department.
As of now, ten higher education police departments have made the pledge.
Contributing: Colby Walker
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