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Public Employee Press
Profiles in Public Service
Civil Service stars A cops confidant By
GREGORY N. HEIRES Police Chaplains like Rabbi Alvin Kass provide
refuge for Police Officers who often feel they are victims in a judgmental world
where they live under a public microscope. Assistant Chief Kass heads
the Chaplains unit at the Police Dept., where he has worked for over 40 years.
The department has seven Catholic, Protestant and Jewish Chaplains, and is now
trying to fill an opening for a Chaplain of the Muslim faith. Years ago, Kass
was the leading advocate for bringing Chaplains into DC 37s Local 299.
A great part of my work is counseling face-to-face, interacting with
Police Officers, who have a tremendously stressful calling, Kass said.
Whatever is told to us remains absolutely confidential, he said.
Our first duty is to the Officers. If they werent confident that what
they say would not go any further, they wouldnt talk to us.
By listening sympathetically and offering advice, Kass helps Police Officers deal
with workplace conflict, marital troubles, alcoholism, the serious illness or
death of a family member or the anguish stemming from a shooting. Perhaps most
important, like the other Chaplains, Kass is simply a friend. He understands
why some people think Officers adopt an us against the world perspective.
They risk their lives every day as they carry out their duty to enforce the law
in a community of 8 million people who are quick to question their judgment.
We cope with emergencies 24/7, Kass said. If a cop is shot
or killed, we respond to the scene. One of his fondest memories concerns
a Police Officer who decided to study as a way of coping with the death of his
young boy and later told Kass that the educational experience with him had transformed
his life. Despite his vast experience, he finds cop shootings personally
traumatic events that are impossible to treat with clinical detachment. Nearly
six years after 9/11, Kass still has painful memories of consoling the families
of the departments victims. When a cop is injured,
Kass said, we talk to the cop and family. When a cop is killed, its
the most difficult assignment a Chaplain can ever have. The experience takes so
much out of you that I have problems functioning for days. Kass
earned a masters degree in history at Columbia University and a doctorate
in philosophy from New York University. After studying at the Jewish Theological
Seminary, he was ordained a rabbi in 1962 and served as a Chaplain in the U.S.
Air Force before joining the NYPD. | |