Last week, the Bloomfield Police Department in Connecticut held a ceremony to inaugurate the state’s first woman police chief, Betsy Hard. Hard is a twenty-year veteran of the Santa Monica, California Police Department, where she climbed from the rank of officer to commander. The town of Bloomfield reported that Hard was chosen for her strong community policing skills, and respected history in law enforcement. Bloomfield Town Manager Louie Chapman Jr. commented that Hard “reflects a keen understanding of the role of the police department as a positive factor in the community. It’s an approach to policing that says you don’t have to be an occupying force in the community to enforce the laws.” The National Center for Women & Policing congratulates Betsy Hard for breaking a glass ceiling and commends her for her achievements. Women are still starkly underrepresented in law enforcement’s top command, holding only 7.3% of top command positions and 9.6% of supervisory positions, as reported in our 2001 Status of Women in Policing survey.
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