Many years ago the public police were those who were responsible for keeping the peace, and making sure that society was kept safe within the jurisdiction that they patrol. Private security at one time was not very popular because of the cost that a company or citizen would have to pay, and many years ago many people could not afford to have private security watch the properties or companies.
Today private security and public police can be found working together to keep society safe. These two types of security can be found at numerous places such as school events, sporting events, and stores. Most of the security officers who are working at school or other events are usually off-duty police officers. Different areas within the United States have been found to allow security officers to have the same level of arresting powers as public police officers. This can be the lack of public officers available to protect the public.
The training that the security officers are required to obtain versus public police officers is much different. Most times private security officers are only required to have a one state background check, drug test, and obtain a FOID card. The training that a public police officer must obtain is much more extensive. The typical training and screening usually consists of an extensive background check, psychological exam, physical fitness test, and the applicants must also have a minimum level of college credits.
As time has went on private security companies are realizing that the need for better training of the security officers is becoming essential over time. Making sure private security officers are better trained can help the companies to obtain more contracts, and expanding their company to more areas. This will also help the private security industry to compete with the public officers.
Public police officers are in a union and are paid by the taxpayer’s money. This reason alone makes it so anything negative that a public officer does he or she will be held accountable. Private security officers can typically perform a negative act without any consequence. Usually a private security officer can usually pass his or her mistake onto the company that he or she works for because of a technicality within the policy and procedures.
Private security is utilized more often in the last 10 years or so than it once was. Today most celebrities, politicians, and executives of major companies have private security hired as body guards, and this can be because public security is not available at all times and cannot accommodate the needs of the customers. Businesses and private home owners have also moved away from the public officers to private security to protect them and their assets. Private security officers can also been seen protecting malls, airports, and even casinos.
The relationship between the private security industry and public police officers has started to become more positive. The politicians within the communities that have more private security hired has begun to understand the importance of having private security work alongside police officers. The need for more police officers to patrol and protect society is not feasible because of the lack of funding that cities receive. Communities are always safer when there is more security protecting whether it is by public police officers, private security, or a mixture of both.
People of the communities have begun to realize that public police and private security are not in conflict like they once were before. Criminals are now realizing that private security and public police officers are willing to work together to control crime, and decrease the amount of crime taking place. This can be a major deterrence for criminals in today’s society. The economic crisis taking place today has placed a negative impact on private security officers by public officers because of the fear that police officers may be replaced even after all of the education and training that they have done to become a police officer. The economic crisis does have an impact on the funding that the state will receive to hire and maintain the amount of officers, and at this point there is no room to hire extra officers.
The conflict between the public and private security space will influence the relationship between the two. The public police officers can always question, apprehend, and detain a person whether he or she is on public or private grounds. The private security can only perform a citizen’s arrest. They can however search a person without the fear of violating one’s Fifth Amendment rights.
Private and Public security can maintain and improve their relationship by understanding the importance and need of each one. Neither public nor private security can keep order and safety without the help of the other. Many times the safety of a person or property may rely on that both private and public security has worked together to crackdown on crime.
As one can see both private security and public police are needed to maintain the safety of a community. Without both security teams backing one another, and working together to understand the importance of each other society will not and could not be as safe as it is now.
Reference
http://www. angelfire. com/oh5/mminvestigations/enforcement. htm