THE WHITE HOUSE

Office of the Press Secretary

STATEMENT BY THE PRESS SECRETARY

President Clinton today announced that Thomas Frazier, the Commissioner of the Baltimore City Police Department, has been named the Director of the Office of Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS) at the Justice Department.

"Thomas Frazier is one of America's premier law enforcement officers and has long been a leader in community policing," said President Clinton. "The COPS program has been central to the nationwide drop in crime we've seen in recent years. I am pleased that Commissioner Frazier will be leading COPS into the next century as we continue to drive down crime rates all across America."

Thomas Frazier, 54, has been Commissioner of the Baltimore City Police Department since 1994. Before coming to Baltimore, Frazier was with the San Jose, California Police Department for more than 20 years. He is also the current President of the Police Executive Research Forum.

The COPS Office, created in the historic 1994 Crime Act, is the Clinton/Gore Administration's initiative to put 100,000 more police officers on the streets and to bring community policing to cities and towns across the country. Thus far, 100,000 officers have been funded and over 11,300 communities have received COPS grants to fund the additional officers. President Clinton has proposed a 21st Century Policing initiative that would continue the COPS Program and add 30,000 to 50,000 more officers for our communities. The President's initiative would also fund innovative crime-fighting technologies, new community prosecutors, and important crime prevention efforts.

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