The narrative of how Black people and law enforcement interact is often stereotypical and negative given the nation’s violent history of policing in America. It was for a handful of current and former Black officers in Dane County; that narrative resonated until they joined law enforcement and their perspectives shifted, they said at a panel this week.

The Madison Community Policing Foundation, in collaboration with a few other groups, organized the panel Thursday to hear from six officers with the Madison Police Department and Dane County Sheriff’s Office in honor of Black History Month.

Shar-Ron Buie, a data and evaluation analyst with the Dane County Office of Justice Reform, moderated the discussion featuring Lt. Jonathan Triggs and Sgt. Shuntia Lucas from the sheriff, and Sgt. Ray Gillard, Officer Candace Enis, Officer Edward McKinley and retired Officer Pia Kinney James from Madison police.

The conversation touched on the panelists’ personal experiences with policing and what inspired them to join law enforcement. For many, it meant choosing a profession that put them on the right path for their families, communities and careers, and for others, breaking barriers came naturally.

Triggs talked about his journey at the sheriff and how leadership for him was built under pressure. Leadership is about learning who you are because pressure clarifies your character, Triggs said.

“When I first had to tell a family that their loved one was not coming home, that changed me. When I had to discipline a well-respected deputy, that I once respected and I knew, that changed me. That changes how you learn and how you become a leader. It changes what your belief is on how to go about doing things and how to lead,” Triggs said. “I try to lead with emotional intelligence, integrity and the desire to help others.”

Kinney James and Lucas talked about their experiences being the first Black women to break glass ceilings in local law enforcement. Kinney James was the first Black woman to join Madison’s police force in 1975, and she talked about taking up a position of individual leadership within her role both in the agency and in the community, which wasn’t always welcoming.

“We were coming off of the Vietnam War, Civil Rights unrest, women’s rights issues and no one wanted to see a Black officer — female Black officer. … I told people way back when that the women were here to stay. That was a leadership role that I took on,” Kinney James said.

Fifty years later, Lucas made history as the first Black woman to be named a sergeant at the Sheriff’s Office. Lucas previously broke ground being promoted to a booking deputy at the county jail after the agency went two decades without hiring a Black woman there, she said.

“I represent what I always phrase as a triple threat: a well-educated, double minority in the field. And I represent a Black woman who had her mother and father who said, ‘I’m proud of you. You will be something,’” Lucas said.

Her life experience, emotional intelligence and upbringing help to connect with people on calls, Lucas said.

The panelists talked about how their experiences before joining law enforcement have shaped how they now seek to build trust and understanding with others outside policing. Kinney James described the importance of empathy, and how it benefits the community and the Police Department. In the 1980s, Kinney James said, people in the neighborhood where she patrolled initially gave her a hard time but later protected her from gangs.

She shared how her supervisor once responded when a woman refused to let Kinney James enter a home over her identity. “Tell that person that if they want police service, you’re there, and if she doesn’t want you, then she’s not getting anybody,” Kinney James recalled.

Having supervisors who placed trust in her helped generate more trust in the community, but it takes intentionality and time in addition to effective policy and procedure, she said.

“It’s getting people to know kind of what we’re about — also training, teaching that there’s resources out there that they may not have known about — that’s community policing. It’s a good thing,” she said.

As more veteran officers discussed their challenges, Enis said her take at Madison police is to embrace empathy, education and understanding in her role.

“For me, I look at the totality of everything — a way a person was brought up, a way their community is, a way their lifestyle is — and I take that into every call,” said Enis, a community outreach and resource education officer.

Gillard talked about his entryway into policing after he initially rejected the idea while working on his degree.

“Growing up on the south side of Chicago, seeing how the police interacted with my community and my friends and how they treated me, I had this perception that, you know, all police were bad,” Gillard said.

After having his second son, Gillard said, he decided to move from Chicago and prioritize his education, but after sharing his story with a lieutenant at the time and talking with Madison Capt. Harrison Zanders, he gave it a shot.

McKinley described a similar perspective, feeling like police growing up didn’t “do anything.” He reflected on the impact of being racially profiled in a small town, witnessing someone die while waiting for police that never came and “driving while Black.”

“To fix a problem, you got to be a part of the solution. You can’t take a step back and go, ‘Somebody needs to do something about that.’ We need somebody that’s gonna say, ‘I’m gonna do something about that.’ That’s what I wanted to do,” McKinley said.

Gillard said he now works to ensure community members have more faith in the police by being the example he wishes he had, especially among youth.

“I always understood that whenever I put on my uniform, I was going to treat people better than I was treated. And I understood that if I wanted to see change within the police organization or the police realm, I had to do something to be that change. I had to make sure that my kids see someone in uniform that they can trust and that they believed in,” Gillard said. “I like talking to people, and my thing is community engagement. I truly believe that I cannot do my job successfully without everyone in here and everyone in the community that I serve.”