Coffee With A Cop A Success In Newport

By Robin Smith, Caledonian Record
Original article HERE

“I wanted to let them know how much I support them.”

Debbie Vacca of Derby came to Newport City Wednesday morning to talk with local police officers during a Coffee With A Cop gathering at Brenda’s Home Cooking on Main Street.

A member of St. Mark’s Episcopal Church in Newport, Vacca sat down with Officer Royce Lancaster to talk while other patrons enjoyed a late breakfast or morning snack.

She welcomed the chance to meet with police officers and friends over coffee.

“This is great,” Vacca said. “They are showing the community they care and are doing great things.”

“It’s an opportunity for use to engage the public on a more casual level,” Chief Seth DiSanto said.

By mid-morning, he had fielded questions about panhandling, and talked about the city’s efforts to create a regional dispatch center.

He also talked about the Prevention, Intervention, Treatment and Recovery (PITR) Collaborative that brings all the agencies and community groups involved in the opioid epidemic together to seek resolutions.

DiSanto said some residents were surprised that the police cannot charge someone for panhandling, which American Civil Liberties Union says has been ruled as free speech by the U.S. Supreme Court.

Police can charge people for trespassing or disorderly conduct if that occurs at the same time as panhandling.

DiSanto said he’s heard some ideas that the police can follow-up on.

Joining DiSanto and Lancaster was Officer David Jacobs.

The success of Wednesday’s event makes it likely that the police department will do more coffee chats in the future, Lancaster and DiSanto said.

Sherri Sullivan of AudioCarve paid for the first 25 coffees sold during the Coffee With A Cop morning. The rest will be paid for by Steve Marsh, said Nico Hastings of Brenda’s.

Sullivan said they wanted to show support for the police.

“They work really hard in our community,” she said.

Doing something like paying for the coffee of patrons who visit with the officers is their way of “paying it forward,” she said.

The police department asked if Brenda’s would host Coffee With A Cop, and Brenda’s owner Jessica Kennison said she’s glad she did.

“It’s good for the local people to talk in an informal setting,” Kennison said.

“It’s nice that they are taking the time to do this,” she said of the police.

“It shows they care about the city.”