Roxbury’s top cop earns marks as ambassador to chief

Yawu Miller

Neighborhood volunteers had assembled 800 flowers, shrubs and plants in their effort to beautify a park on Julian Street in Roxbury.

Working with several dozen teens and volunteers from the Dudley Street Neighborhood Initiative, the neighbors had obtained a backhoe and began digging holes for the plants when several police officers appeared on the scene and ordered them to stop.

The neighbors had neglected to obtain a permit to operate the heavy machinery and hire the requisite police detail. Words were exchanged, feelings were hurt and the backhoe was taken out of commission.

The following Monday, DSNI Executive Director John Barros fired off a letter to Commissioner Kathy O’Toole, who promptly wrote back. After the letter came a visit from Area B Deputy Superintendent Rafael Ruiz.

“He sat down with the kids and had a conversation,” Barros said. “That was very helpful. He dealt with it in an hands-on way.”

Ruiz’s hands-on approach to community policing has earned him high marks in the Roxbury community where he has served for the last five years.

“He’s a good problem-solver,” said Joyce Stanley, who heads the Dudley Square Main Streets Association. “He’s always ready to listen.”

Ruiz’s career in police work came in the late ’70s when, as a student at Roxbury Community College, he saw a flier advertising the examination for the police academy. He took the exam and soon after was on the beat in Area B during the drug wars of the early ‘80s.

“No way was I thinking that I’d ever be in this office as the commander of the area,” Ruiz says.

It was after a stint working as a citywide commander that Ruiz was tapped to lead Area B.

The assignment was his first brush with community policing. As it turned out, it was a good fit. In his five years working out of the Area B station’s corner office, Ruiz has managed to integrate himself into the community, forming working relationships with numerous neighborhood groups and community activists.

He sits on the board of the nonprofit Hispanic Office of Planning and Evaluation and Roxbury Youthworks. He is a co-chairman of the Grove Hall Safe Neighborhood Initiative and regularly attends meetings at neighborhood anti-crime groups throughout Area B, which covers Roxbury, parts of Dorchester and Mattapan.

Ruiz also conducts courses in Spanish as part of the Citizens Police Academy, an initiative aimed at giving civilians a better understanding of police work.

His social capital in the city’s communities of color has made him an ambassador to the community representing not only Area B, but the entire police department. As Barros found out in August, Police Commissioner Kathleen O’Toole now uses Ruiz as her liaison to the community.

“I have her ear,” Ruiz said. “If she’s not available, people can call me and I will get the message to her.”

Ruiz functions more as a political figure than a law enforcement official, focusing on quality of life issues.

Ruiz deals with issues ranging from the illegal parking of 18-wheel trucks on residential streets to finding productive activities for local teenagers. As the public face of the police in the community, it’s often Ruiz who takes the calls.

“People aren’t afraid to call you and say what they need,” he comments. “It makes my job easier. It lets you know when things are happening quicker.”