LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WDRB) -- On West Kentucky Street in the heart of west Louisville, George Fields and the Rev. Leonard E. Boyd see the good, the bad and the ugly.
“Just yesterday we had a drive-by shooting right there on 26th," Boyd said, as he sat beside Fields on the front porch of his home.
The two also see LMPD officers a lot but confess they don’t truly trust them or know any of them on a personal level.
Councilman Bill Hollander, D-9, might know why.
“We have a lot of work to do to restore trust between police officers and the community," he said.
Hollander thinks where LMPD officers live might be part of the solution.
After hearing Rev. Jesse Jackson speak on that topic in Louisville days ago, Hollander was curious: where do LMPD officers live?
LMPD Officer Residency by Zip Code
Data he uncovered and sent to WDRB News suggests that of the department’s 1,157 officers, just two live in Boyd’s West Louisville zip code of 40211 and only one lives in the 40212 zip code that includes some of Portland and Shawnee.
On the other hand, 89 LMPD officers live in the 40291 zip code that includes Fern Creek, 76 in the 40299 zip code that includes Jeffersontown, and 66 live in the 40245 zip code east of Middletown.
The raw data is posted in the document below.
The data also shows that at least a third of LMPD officers live outside Louisville, with 70 in Oldham County, 48 in Spencer County, 99 in Bullitt County, and 102 in in southern Indiana.
“There are probably lots of reasons for that, and I’m not particularly criticizing anybody for it, but I think it’s something clearly that the community needs to look at," Hollander said.
Hollander said, by law, the city can’t tell officers where to live, but it could incentivize officers to live in under-represented areas such as Boyd's zip code to help bridge the gap between law enforcement and residents.
A spokesperson confirmed that LMPD does not have any programs that provide incentives for living in particular areas.
Boyd said having police officers living in his neighborhood might make a difference.
“If they lived here and worked here at the same time, I believe that we could have a bond," he said. "We can begin a bond because of the simple fact is, ‘Okay, we out here together.’”
Copyright 2020 Media. All Rights Reserved.
