My name is Roy Frost and I am the new Police Chief in Billerica. On December 21, 2021 Town Manager John Curran appointed me to lead the Billerica Police Department. Over the past eight years I have served as Deputy Chief under former Chief, Dan Rosa. I live in Billerica with my wife and children who all attend Billerica public schools. I love this community and excited for the opportunity to serve the town in this new position.

As we are slowly coming out of the recent world-wide pandemic, I hope to personally meet as many residents and business owners as possible. I am a strong believer in the principals of Community Policing, specifically partnering with a cross section of the community to jointly identify problems and develop proactive ways to address them. As a longtime resident, parent, student and employee in the Town of Billerica, I have a strong sense of the need for fostering trust and cooperation with our neighbors. We only need to look at the national news to see that law enforcement is facing a crisis in the area of Trust and Legitimacy when it comes to being fair and impartial stewards of the law. Although the majority of the approximate 700,000 law enforcement officers in this country honorably serve the public every day, placing their lives on the line, we also recognize that there are many examples of these trusted public servants falling far short of their oath. Going back to the time of Sir Robert Peel in 1830, founder of the world renowned Metropolitan Police Service and considered by many to be father of British and American policing, modern policing learned early on the importance of his 7th principal of policing “Police, at all times, should maintain a relationship with the public that gives reality to the historic tradition that the police are the public and the public are the police; the police being only members of the public who are paid to give full-time attention to duties incumbent on every citizen in the interests of community welfare and existence”. As your Police Chief I am committed to leading the department with this principal in mind.

While I recognize that Billerica has consistently received high marks by outside evaluators as being a safe place to live in national comparison with other similarly sized communities, I am also keenly aware that each individuals’ perception of safety must be factored when considering community health and safety. Expanding on the work of former Chief Rosa, I will concentrate additional time and resources in the development of community partnerships throughout all sectors of Billerica. This will include increased engagement of young people, through collaboration with our Recreation Department and Boys and Girls Club as well as through PAL (Police Athletic League). Our Community Engagement officer, Lt Troy Opland, has recently organized a Ball Hockey Tournament during April School vacation. The tournament will consist of three division for youth as young as eight to high school age, who will be coached by volunteer Billerica Police officers. We are also developing Flag Football and Street Hockey options for the summer and fall months. In addition to our youth engagement, we are also planning events to interact with our seniors in collaboration with the Council on Aging, such as a breakfast event where officers will serve seniors while also providing scam avoidance education and awareness related to the ever-increasing financial targeting of our senior population. Additionally, we are planning events with our Faith Community to engage them on safety and security measures related to the physical security of congregants as well as vandalism detection and awareness related to hate and intolerance. Moreover, we have already started up our highly successful Coffee with a Cop program, having recently run another well-attended community collaboration at Panera Bread in North Billerica earlier this past March. We are planning to continue these, as well as more neighborhood-centered community meeting events, to collaborate and problem solve with our residents on the best ways to improve their quality of life.

I look forward to working with all of you in the community as I work towards successfully leading your police department. Please feel free to visit our website at www.billericapolice.org for a more detailed listing of our services. Also, please look for our newly released Community Survey to help us obtain accurate and relevant feedback from the community related to current perceptions, needs and wants of a representative cross-section of the community. Your input is vital to the safe and healthy growth of your town.

2022 Community Survey – https://police.billericaps.com/index.php/2022-community-survey/

Sincerely.
Chief Roy W Frost