Relationships between police and residents in Baltimore are in desperate need are in need of repair.
The situation was made worse by last year's riots, but out of the unrest came an idea vested parties feel could go a long way in reversing the mistrust.
Last year the Baltimore Police Department received just shy of 800 cases detailing some type of complaint against city officers. In February, they started a new approach to find results to those complaints - mediation.
An early look at the program shows there are high hopes.
As long as there have been heated disagreements between BPD officers and city residents, resolutions to those disagreements have been kept mostly secret. That era, according to BPD, is over.
"We're calling it a soft rollout," said Chief Rodney Hill of the department's internal affairs division.
The program will take a citizen making a complaint, the officer, or officers, complained about, and group them with trained mediators to discuss their differences.
"It's not just we're just doing this to make the police look good in people's eyes; we're doing this so the police, also, maybe they'll recognize and look at someone different and go 'I never thought that,'" Hill said.
Once a complaint is made, it is categorized in one of five ways, then is sent through a lengthy review process that could take as long as a year to resolve. Even then, the result of that complaint is kept private. Mediation preempts the investigation, labeling complaints according to four pre-determined outcomes.
Though one of those outcomes could be "un-sustained," Hill said he was open to changing it.
Dr. Zackary Berger is the program's first test after he filed a complaint related to a Jan. run-in with an officer, he said.
His complaint was filed after he said he was approached by an officer, identifiable only by the police vest he was wearing, and handcuffed while walking to the store. He said his pockets were searched, he was questioned about some kind of "pill bottle," and then was let go.
Berger said he's never had any legal issues, so the experience left him confused.
"Among the things he certainly did not say were 'I'd like to get your permission, here's why I'm doing this,'" Berger said of the encounter.
Situations like Berger's are why Chonga Onyongo, who runs non-profit Community Mediation Baltimore, said mediation can help. Their services will be given to BPD for free.
"I'm not going to say that every single mediation winds up with a kumbaya and people singing songs. That's not even what we're here for. What we're here for is to have one side understand the other side and have people see each other as humans," he said.
The mediation model follows similar programs set up in New Orleans, New York City and in Ohio.
Few stats are kept on the successes of each program, but anecdotal analysis suggest pro-active efforts aimed at building community relationships result in an overall decrease of complaints.
