Innovation and Change Through Police Research and Development/Planning Units

Brenda J. Bond-Fortier, PhD is Professor at Suffolk University. Dr. Bond-Fortier specializes in police organizational change, performance measurement, collaboration, and policy and practiceimplementation. Her book, Organizational Change in an Urban Police Department: Innovating to Reform (2020) analyzes changes in policy, practice and community relationships. Brenda’s recent work explores public safety change in higher education. Brenda is a consultant with 21CP Solutions, Inc. working on re-imagining campus public safety. Dr. Bond-Fortier served as SME for the Bureau of Justice Assistance Strategies for Policing Innovation initiative. She previously served as Research Associate at the Kennedy School of Government Program in Criminal Justice Policy & Management, as Advisor for the Northeastern Massachusetts Law Enforcement Council, and as Director of Research and Development at the Lowell, Massachusetts PD.

Dr. Bond-Fortier received a PhD and MA from the Heller School for Social Policy and Management at Brandeis University, a Master of Arts in Community Social Psychology and a Bachelor of Science in CJ from University of Massachusetts Lowell.

Maria C. Cheevers, M Ed, has been the Director of the Boston Police Department’s (BPD) Office of Research and Development (ORD) since March 2011. In that role she leads a staff of seven in the development, implementation, management and evaluation of up to $24 million per year in grant program funds; prepares various crime data and performance measurement reports, best practice research reviews and policy documents. Ms. Cheevers is currently leading Boston’s Citywide HUB initiative; while supervising up to twenty additional best practice models. Prior to 2011, Ms. Cheevers was one- third owner of Grants Etcetera, Inc.; she developed MA’s first comprehensive reentry model for young girls coming out of the MA’s juvenile justice system, the Female Focus Initiative, while leading the Boston Coalition Against Drugs and Violence; and was the Assistant Director of the BPD’s Office of Strategic Planning. At that time she developed Boston’s first Safe Neighborhood Initiative, Youth Connect, and the BPD’s award-winning Comprehensive Communities Program, implementing a citywide Strategic Planning Initiative to bring community policing to scale in the City of Boston.

Jenna Savage, PhD, is the Deputy Director of the Boston Police Department (BPD) Office of Research and Development (ORD). Jenna oversees BPD research partnerships with local colleges and universities, as well as internal research projects initiated by ORD. Since 2010, she has coordinated the BPD’s numerous mental health-related projects—including developing and overseeing the BPD’s partnership with the Boston Emergency Services Team (BEST), where Master’s-level BEST clinicians are paired with BPD officers in an attempt to improve response to individuals experiencing mental health crises; assisting with the creation and implementation of the BPD’s 40-hour Crisis Intervention Team (CIT) training; and co-chairing a Steering Committee and Subcommittee of Boston’s Community Justice Project (a Sequential Intercept Mapping initiative spearheaded by the MA Trial Court). Other responsibilities include grant writing, grant management, and responding to both internal and external information requests. Jenna received her PhD in Criminology and Justice Policy from Northeastern University in 2011, and has been working full-time in ORD since 2009.