The department has been uploading videos to its own website routinely, but the creation of a YouTube channel may be a reaction to requests by local computer programmer Tim Clemans for more transparency. The videos feature helicopter pilots communicating with ground teams to investigate various emergency or crime scenes.
The channel is just one of many efforts launched around the nation designed to improve police transparency or to humanize police. A music video released by police in Dover, Del., in January featuring a police officer singing Taylor Swift’s Shake it Off has received more than 3 million views.
A video shared by police in Tukwila, Wash., shows a police officer pulling over a driver to give her a warning for a burned out tail light. Clemans, who hosts the video on his own police video YouTube channel, said he thinks Tukwila Police picked the video to show the public that police sometimes do nice things too.
In July 2014, a video that made the news featured three Kansas City, Mo., police who blocked off a residential street so they could play basketball with some neighborhood kids.
A Facebook page called A Warmer Shade of Blue. Stories About Good Things Cops Do, also features stories of police officers doing good things in the course of their work that may typically go unnoticed by the media.
