Episode 37 - Breaking Barriers: Captain Jolie Macias on SWAT Leadership and Use of Force Training

Episode Resources

• Artemis Self-Defense Training 
• Cleared Hot Podcast
• Jocko Podcast

Guest Information

Captain Jolie Macias was hired with the Newark Police Department as a police officer in 2004.  In 2014 she was promoted to the rank of sergeant and later promoted to the rank of lieutenant in 2017. Captain Macias has a wide organizational perspective from her experiences working in both the Field Operations and Support Services divisions of the police department.

Initially assigned as an Operations Lieutenant, Captain Macias has overseen multiple patrol teams, the Detective Unit, Traffic, patrol scheduling, and the School Resource program.  Captain Macias helped develop and implement the Tri-City Crowd Management Team, which has been a collaborative resource for the Alameda County Sideshow Task Force. She has served as the Tactical Commander of the SWAT and Crisis Negotiations Team, in addition to leading the Use of Force training staff and Peer Support Teams

As the Support Services Lieutenant since November of 2020, Captain Macias worked in an administrative capacity and was instrumental in supervising the move into the new police facility. She worked closely with professional staff in the Records and Property Unit and the Communications Center. She managed hiring and recruitment efforts as well as Professional Standards and Training.

During her time as police sergeant, she supervised a busy weekend patrol team where she served as the front-line supervisor for several major critical incidents.  Captain Macias served as the SWAT Team Leader and led the team during multiple Urban Shield training events. She formed a strong partnership with the Newark Unified School District, creatively solving a need for a unified emergency protocol, and developed the School Safety program.

Captain Macias completed a three-year rotation as a detective for the Southern Alameda County Major Crimes Task Force. In addition to investigating both gang and narcotic crimes, she testified as a court recognized drug expert and worked in a variety of undercover capacities. As an officer she served as a Field Training Officer, Explorer Advisor, and was a member of the SWAT Team.

She is a recent graduate of the California POST Command College and is currently enrolled in a Master of Law Enforcement and Public Safety Leadership program at the University of San Diego. She also holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Business Administration from San Francisco State University. 

Jolie has deep roots in the city of Newark and worked in the Rec Department as a dance instructor prior to being hired with the police department.  She remains connected to the city on and off duty spending time shopping, dining, and skating within the Newark community with her family and friends.

Transcript

Madi: Welcome to the Blue Leadership Podcast, hosted by Dennis Nayor, a retired multi-agency police chief from the state of New York. Blue Leadership is a podcast by law enforcement for today’s law enforcement leaders, taking you inside the experiences and careers of public safety experts from across the country.

Dennis Nayor: Well, great to be back here, episode 37. And today’s guest is Captain Jolie Macias from the Newark, California Police Department. Captain Macias has over 20 years in law enforcement. She’s been a team leader and commander for her agency’s SWAT team, um, leads the use of force training for her department, has a lot to do with peer support, has done a lot with crowd management, graduate of the Command College, and also the Law Enforcement and Public Safety Leadership Master’s Degree Program at the University of San Diego. Lots more I could say, but with that, Captain Macias, thank you for being here.

Jolie Macias (she/her): Thank you so much, Dennis. I’m happy to be here.

Dennis Nayor: Well, I’m going to ask the first question. Your role as commander of your SWAT team, can you just talk a little bit about that, about, um, what that role entailed and, and what drew you specifically to that particular job type?

Jolie Macias (she/her): Yeah, absolutely. I think I have to go back to the beginning of my police career to kind of lay that foundation. Um, I, I started as a police officer for the city of Newark and in 2004, as soon as I was eligible and, um, off of Uh, probation, I had the opportunity to try out for the SWAT team, and, um, I was fortunate enough to, to make, make the team on my first attempt, and, um, I had many experiences as an operator from between 2006 through, uh, 2013, um, after that, I, I became, uh, when I promoted to sergeant, I, I became one of two team leaders.

And I, I had incredible experiences, uh, as a, as a team leader. Um, and then I promoted to Lieutenant in, in 2017. And, and at that time, um, there was an opportunity for me to, um, to take on the role as, as the tactical commander of the team. It was just natural. All of my operational team leader experiences, um, I was, It just, it just made sense for me to step up and take on that role.

Dennis Nayor: And what drew, drove you or drew you into that particular facet of law enforcement? Because law enforcement, as we all know, people can go into the investigative route. They can go into, um, just pursuing supervisory roles or admin. Um, so what is it that specifically drew you to that tactical component.

Jolie Macias (she/her): Yeah, absolutely. Great question. Um, so from the beginning, my decision to, to become a SWAT operator was all about my ability to get more training and to be safe on the street. I knew that as a patrol person, a patrol officer, I was going to be most likely, um, working patrol 90 percent of my time, if not more, and possibly, uh, working in a SWAT capacity.

You know, five to 10 percent of the time, potentially. And so I knew all that additional training received. The SWAT team trains twice a month, um, whereas everyone else in the department does, does quite a bit of training. They, they train, um, nearly monthly, shy for, for two months because of, um, You know, holidays and, and, and major city events, but, um, that additional two days a month training, I knew it was going to keep me safer.

I’m also a very athletic, um, physically active person. So it just, and, and a team, team sport person. So those types of things were, were a perfect fit for, for my personality, kind of my personal drive and, and me just knowing that it was going to help me in the long run be safer. During that 90 percent of the time on the street?

Dennis Nayor: Captain, one, one thing that I think is important for the listeners and viewers to know is there’s certain agencies that are very large agencies, state agencies, LAPD, things like that. They may have full time, dedicated SWAT teams and operators that that’s their sole assignment, but a lot of agencies that isn’t possible.

So, um, I’m going to ask you and I’m guessing your SWAT team, all the members of that, even though they’re at an elite level of how they train, um, They also have other roles, is that correct?

Jolie Macias (she/her): Oh, 100 percent correct. Um, all of our team is a collateral team and and that is the case for for much of the SF Bay Area region here in Alameda County. There are no full time SWAT teams. The Sheriff’s Office does not have a full time SWAT team. Not even Oakland Police Department has a full time SWAT team.

So we have to have really good relationships with with each other to support each other. And that’s why we have a very strong kinship and and tight knit tactical community here. We have to often work together and and support each other. Additionally, like you mentioned, you never know who’s going to show up on a call.

It could be, you know, a team with quite a few SWAT team members responding to a patrol call. And it’s also important to make note that, um, a patrol sergeant who may or may not have tactical experience, um, is often relies upon those tactical operators on the team to help run incidents, um, that might just be edging into that, um, potential SWAT callout, uh, realm.

And so, yeah, unfortunately, just a collateral team, but, you know, just as, just as good training.

Dennis Nayor: Yeah, and for the listeners and viewers, we were talking offline about just how important that is that when an officer is responding to a disturbance call, the people who called who are getting an officer are getting an officer that could very likely be a highly trained tactical operator. who’s handling a basic call for service.

And that’s going to have tremendous value in de escalation in, in, in making sure that, you know, everything is done in a way that safety is, um, is a priority and the, the tactics employed are, are, are very, um, are very instrumental in the success of it. So I think that’s, that’s really important to know. And as from an administrative point of view, one of the reasons I was always able to support the value of a tactical team is because I knew that they would bring that type of training and expertise to every type of call for service, and that’s invaluable.

Jolie Macias (she/her): I think I will just add Dennis, um, not just the, the training and expertise, but knowing the resources. And the tools and equipment that they have access to and trained on that not all of the rest of the patrol staff has access to. So, for example, a use of an interior robot to go attempt to make a clear, or, uh, possibly the use of a, of a flashbang if, if necessary.

Um, all those, all those tools that, um, uh, they have at, at the ready. And then additionally knowing the allied agencies and cause sometimes they have tools that, that we don’t, um, ensuring that you have a familiarity with, with your own tools and then the agencies around you and having, um, team members that have that training is, is completely invaluable for the safety of our community as a whole.

Dennis Nayor: Without a doubt, I’m glad that we didn’t miss covering that component because that’s key because I think a lot of the people watching who are, have tactical teams will be part of teams that are part time and won’t, and will have very similar operating methodology. So I’m really glad we remembered to get that into the mix.

Jolie Macias (she/her): Awesome.

Dennis Nayor: And what did you do to set yourself up? Were there specific trainings that you went to before you got onto your department SWAT team?

Jolie Macias (she/her): Honestly, no. I attended training of the team prior to being a member of the team just so I could have a firm understanding of what they were doing. I wasn’t familiar with team tactics. I wasn’t familiar with building clearing. Just the very basic firearms type experience from my academy. I’m not like a Uh, a gun person.

I don’t go hunting or I don’t have those types of, um, foundational skills prior to, uh, working in law enforcement. But I, um, I was training for triathlons. I was a, a rock climber. Um, just, just very active and, and knew that, um, I had this, um, athleticism and, and physical ability that I, I was gonna be, I was confident that I was gonna be able to pass the physical component

I had to definitely do a little bit more, um, personal, uh, work toward, um, being proficient with firearms.

Dennis Nayor: Yeah, one of the things that this podcast will have a strong reach and value toward is a lot of women in law enforcement, especially as we look at the 30 by 30 initiative, which is to have 30 percent of the police and workforce be female by the year 2030. And if you look at the statistics of the amount of women that are in supervisory ranks is much less than their male counterparts.

And this is, this podcast is going to have a lot of value in just breaking that glass ceiling of showing that women can also do an amazing job in a tactical team component. And was that hard for you to shatter that myth that was really mostly a male dominated role, that for you to be able to not only be on your tactical team, but leading the team,

Jolie Macias (she/her): You know, I, I, uh, I’ve had this question many, many times. And, and honestly, I have to give a lot of accolades to the department that I work for and the city that I work for. Because from the start, I never felt . Inequities, um, as, as a woman coming into, um, any type of role where we have a very fair testing process.

Um, in 2004, that was the first woman to, to make it onto the team, but they saw very quickly because I was outperforming many of the men on the team, it just shattered the, um, I just proved myself very quickly, um, on my personal, physical abilities. Um, and then my commitment to ensuring that I was proficient in the movements, tactics, firearms, et cetera. So I was able to gain that credibility very quick, but I know that it had a lot to do with the very inclusive culture that is already here at the department that I work for. I’m very aware that not all women are are as fortunate as I am. And so I, I would just make the, the, um, give the, the advice that you have to put the investment in yourself, to put the work in.

I was very, I was lucky to have a very solid athletic background prior, you know, competitive athlete. And, um, You know, some, some women might have to spend a little bit more time in the gym ahead of time to build, to build that expected upper body strength that isn’t always as, um, natural to come for many.

Um, I, I will also add that, um, and this is just a boast for, for my department, the 30 by 30 initiative. Uh, we’re very proud here at Newark Police Department. We’ve had 30%. We fluctuate up and down, um, right around that 30 percent mark, and that wasn’t, um, because of focused recruitment towards, towards women.

I think it really has a lot to do with what I’m talking about, that equitable culture that was created there. And, and women. who, um, were applying saw that and saw that Newark Police Department up until a month ago when we had a female police chief had, um, women representation at every rank of the department from officer, sergeant, lieutenant, captain, and chief.

Um, we currently Um, have all ranks except for police chief, but, um, yeah, I’m just, I’m just very, very fortunate in a very fortunate position.

Dennis Nayor: That’s great to hear. And as a follow up to that, kind of a corollary, What advice would you give, obviously you’re very fortunate to have an agency that um, is, is culturally based in that way. What advice would you give to women who want to pursue that same pathway of, of being on a tactical team? Or we’re going to talk a little bit about use of force and things like that. Um, What advice would you offer?

Jolie Macias (she/her): This, this is the advice that I wouldn’t just offer women. I would offer this to, to anybody that’s, um, seeking a, a, an appointment to a tactical team. You have to have a team mentality. You have to, um, be willing to, to put in the work and step up for your, for your, um, your, your teammates. Um, but, but more so you have to have a little bit of a thick skin and, um, a big part of tactical trainings and operations is your after action or hot wash, whatever you want to call it, your debrief. And, um, if you can’t handle constructive criticism, and sometimes it’s not relayed so gently, um, you, you have to be able to listen, absorb it, and be able to, um, act upon it the next time because if you continue to make those mistakes, your teammates see it.

And that goes for everybody. That’s not just women.

You definitely have to have a little bit of a thick skin to be part of a that type of team.

Dennis Nayor: Yeah, for sure. And I always know after, in my second agency I led, we had a certified SWAT team and they were one of only a very, very small percentage in the entire state that had achieved that standard. And, um, and again, they were two days of training per month and national trainings and, and very, very squared away. And I, I might stop and see the team briefly after a serious operation, but then I left it to themselves to do their debrief so that I was gone and they could be honest with each other and they could have those critical conversations because like you said, without them, you’ll never get past, you’ll never evolve to the degree that you need to.

Jolie Macias (she/her): That’s right. That’s right. You have to have the ability to self reflect and improve because you never know when you’re gonna come face to face with a another circumstance where you need to be able to um, Oftentimes you have to admit your faults and be able to admit to not just yourself, but to your teammates that you messed something up.

And that, that also goes for the team leaders and the commanders, not, not just the operators. That goes all the way up and down. And that’s how you build trust on your team.

Dennis Nayor: And here’s a perfect segue. So every, every operation has an ops plan and you look at contingencies. You look at, you know, different variables that can go wrong and you put the odds in your favor that they go as correctly as possible. Likely you have a SWOT matrix. You see where the threshold is, where the threat is, but even with that, you don’t always have perfection.

It’s just, it’s just the nature of it. Can you just talk about, an operation that didn’t go right, and how you managed it afterwards or during it.

Jolie Macias (she/her): Well, I, I, the, the operation that, that comes to mind was not a preplanned operation. So there wasn’t a comprehensive SWOT matrix. Um, there wasn’t Um, a full on operation plan, which, as, as you know, um, when there is a pre planned event, there is a ton of work, weeks, potentially, worth of work that goes into, um, surveillance and floor planning and team building and, and usually, uh, for team our size, um, it, it requires, um, multi jurisdictional teams to come together to, to execute, um, an operation.

This, this was an in, in the moment, um, response to two officers in an adjacent city. Um, being shot at. They, they were shot. And, um, our team was the first team to land on the residence where we thought the, the responsible was inside. And, um, I mentioned as a, um, earlier when I became sergeant, I was one of two team leaders and the, uh, the other team leader who was more, uh, experienced and senior to me was, uh, out of town.

And this was my first operation, um, on my own. As, as team leader. And, um,

as I, as I respond, and I’ll just backtrack a little bit as I responded, um, to this, to this agency, this next door, city next door, where I happen to also live. And I had, uh, one of my One of my sisters works for that city. So when I heard an officer was shot and I didn’t know who was shot, my initial response was very emotional and I had to put it together, you know, get it together a little bit before I was able to connect and confirm that it wasn’t her.

So as we got on scene, this was a circumstance that was drawn out for many, many hours. We were able to determine that the suspect was inside. There was still gosh, um, probably at least five other agencies that responded. We, we work very closely with, um, the agencies, uh, surrounding us, like I mentioned. And, um, after hours of attempted negotiations, there was a, a time where the suspect claimed that there was possibly a hostage inside.

Um, and, and we were able to determine that that was most likely not the case and that it was a bluff. Um, There was, uh, we attempted to do a, um, to insert hot gas into, into the residence to, to potentially extract and the, um, unfortunately the, the house caught fire and, um, fire was on scene, you know, um, tampering down, down the, the fire that was in the front of the house.

The, um, the suspect was on the phone and, and was claiming that he was trying to get out. And, um, my, my tactical commander at the time, um, or it was a, it was a group of, of commanders that were in, in the, um, command post, uh, requested that we do a, what’s referred to as a, a limited penetration into the back of the house to attempt to extract.

Um, this, this person. And so, um, we did so, um, and was able to see that the house started, it was a, a, a layer of water at the bottom of the floor that we were trudging through. Um, and, and then immediately exfilled when, um, we realized that the suspect most likely had barricaded into, uh, into a bathroom. Um, and, and we were able to see very clearly The house, the fire was reaching toward the area where we were.

And so, um, I mean, the question is, did it not go quite the way that you wanted? Absolutely not. We didn’t intend for, you know, a fire, um, of that, of that magnitude, um, to start. And that really had to do with some of the, um, the training of hot gas that we, um, have done a better job moving forward to, to ensuring, um, that those types of things don’t occur..

Um, and then, additionally, um, just me as a, as a, as a new team leader, in hindsight, not, um, holding, putting the, the kibosh on the, on the entry. Um, I really, uh, in hindsight would have preferred that we’d done measures of pulling the walls down of the residence, um, instead of, um, putting my team into that position, not just, um, in close proximity of the fire, but, but to this suspect still armed, um, who had just shot at two officers, very clearly motivated to shoot at officers.

And so, um, in hindsight, um, massive learning lesson, um, and, and I took ownership of, of that. What I, what I still think is a, is a, is a big error on my part to lead that team into the, into that entry.

Dennis Nayor: Yeah, and that’s a really key word, that ownership, and obviously you’ve, I’m sure, familiar with Jocko Willink and Extreme Ownership, and really from a leadership point of view, it’s really, it’s really one of the main components of a good leader, is to do that and self reflect. And again, these things happen, but to know that Now, the training’s evolved, you do things differently, that’s really what it’s about because there are so many variables and it’s not like Hollywood where everything goes as scripted because you’re doing things on the fly. What I wanted to ask you as a follow up is, obviously use of force now more than ever, there’s just such scrutiny and if everything goes right, well, you exist under the radar and you succeeded in your mission and operation, but anything goes wrong, which it tends to. There’s answering and accountability and how do you manage, how do you do risk management to the degree you need when it involves use of force at the level of tactical operations?

Jolie Macias (she/her): So, honestly, whether it’s a tactical operation or a patrol operation, to me, it’s very similar risk management thought processes. Um, it, it, it really just comes down to assessing priority of life. And if, if you keep that in mind as, as you’re handling, whether it’s a patrol call with a, you know, person with mental illness or, or, you know, a hostage, uh, situation, as long as you’re You’re keeping that priority of life in your forethoughts, it’s going to help you navigate.

And so, just for the audience who might not know what the priority of life is, essentially, your first priority of life is your hostages or your victims. After that, you have to take into consideration potential innocent bystanders that might be affected by whatever, um, decision you’re making. The third, you have to think about your officers and your first responders before your suspect.

And that’s where, on my operation, The suspect was coming a little bit above, not a little bit, we, we put the suspect above our, uh, the officers and first responders and, and that’s, and that was my flaw.

Dennis Nayor: And, when you look at training, obviously we talk a lot about the physical components of training for the tactics, you know, to, you know, there’s a lot of weight you carry, there’s a lot of, fatigue you have to be able to endure. There’s a lot of fine motor skills and gross motor skills, but there also has to be a huge mental component because when you look at use of forces that have gone wrong, a lot of times it’s people who have a lack of training. they they resort to primal instincts. They lose track of their emotional control. So I would imagine, and please, I’d love to hear your thoughts. You are doing a lot of training that reinforces that the tactics that are are not emotionally driven, but situationally driven, and that the people are, that are on those teams, whether as a patrol capacity or as a tag team capacity, very proficient so that the force is commensurate with what’s needed.

Jolie Macias (she/her): Oh, a hundred percent, uh, Dennis. Um, I was also very fortunate here in Alameda County. We had an event, um, that began in 2007, a training and, um, it started as just tactical SWAT competition and training, but then it morphed into much more, uh, realistic Um, where you need to incorporate fire, search and rescue and, and EMS into the, into the training exercise.

So from 2007 and this training went until about just right before the pandemic was exactly what you’re talking about. So we have a ton of staff still here who have experienced this. This is I can’t speak higher of, of how, um, uh, just critical this type of training is. So essentially it, it, it was 48 hours of nonstop training where you went from scenario to scenario, um, and, and building these, these skills, but, um, also it induced fatigue.

Like whether you got a little bit of sleep in between or not, you still had to be on your game and be able to make decisions. Um, uh, with that, in, in, um, the stress induced, um, fatigue built into the nature of, of the exercise. Um, and then you’re immediately given feedback, you know, by, by proctors and, um, you know, like, I mentioned earlier about needing that, that thick skin, being able to recover, maybe you flubbed on one and then you did great on another.

So lots of highs, lots of lows, and then physical challenges in between, um, obstacle courses and, um, long distance, uh, rucks, that type of thing. Um, so our, thankfully, um, we, we’ve had, that was very foundational in establishing a lot of our, our core, um, use of force principles and that, that went not just for our TAC team, a lot of our instructors, um, that are, have been part of the TAC team, are part of our use of force training team for, for the entire department.

So they incorporate a lot of those principles into, um, all use of force training scenario based training. It’s, it’s absolutely needed. We, we also ensure that all of our scenario based training, uh, includes an element of, of de escalation where we also added a component, um, for, for all staff, um, of a, sorry, my radio’s on, I just realized, um, added a component of, um, an additional use of force training called Artemis.

And that’s, um, put on by a woman named Julie Warniak based out of, I think she’s based out of Arizona. And what that does is, is it really creates a Team tactics for, for each patrol team. They train together. Each patrol team trains together and it’s all about pre escalation, what they can do beforehand to lower the, um, the, the potential, um, factors that could, could catalyze a situation.

And then it’s very, everything is very controlled and all about communication with each other to ensure. That things are handled at the lowest level. So it’s all about just ensuring that, you know, those training, um, principles of, um, inducing stress, good communication with team, um, factoring in de escalation and, and, and just working, working together to come out with the, uh, you know, the ideal outcome.

Dennis Nayor: Yeah, and there’s no way to get around it. Scenario based training, RBT, reality based training. That has to be a staple in every organization because if the first time an officer or a tag team is experiencing those emotions or that adrenal surge or whatever is when they’re actually at the scene of an event, then it’s too late.

They have to do it beforehand and what you’re describing is exactly that.

Jolie Macias (she/her): That’s right.

Dennis Nayor: So As we’re winding down, Captain, I think this is just such an important topic that we’re discovering because the way a tactical situation unfolds and is settled, it really depends a lot on what we’re the leadership, the training, the mindsets going in, and you’re doing all of the right things, which is a great message to all the listeners and viewers. I want to ask you if you can just share from a leadership perspective, because everything boils down to quality leadership to have quality results. Is there a favorite book that you’d recommend or podcast and or leadership philosophy that you subscribe to?

Jolie Macias (she/her): I, I really enjoy, um, listening to, um, Cleared Hot podcast. It’s, um, Navy SEAL, his name is Andy Stumpf. He has some, some great guests and some great tidbits. I happened to, to work with him previously. I was a trainer for CrossFit, uh, headquarters. And he, he had, um, gone, he’s gone through quite a bit of, um, Real life combat in Afghanistan.

He, he suffered, um, a, uh, I forget what type of round in, in his hip and his recovery, but he has, has been on a guest on Joe Rogan and Jocko Willink and all this. And I, of course, I’m a fan of, of Jocko and, uh, that type of, his extreme ownership principles are, are completely valuable and applicable for whether it’s, you know, police, military, or just living your life.

Um, but just, just good. The way it, it comes across very, um, colloquial, you know, it’s not trying to give you a, something kind of philosophical and, and that’s not tangible. It’s very, you know, relatable and, and easy to, to, to swallow and understand. But honestly, I don’t spend a lot of time listening or, or reading a lot of leadership books.

I personally like to diversify and listen to different political, uh, type, uh, information and on all ends of the spectrum because I want to be, as a leader, I want to be informed about like all, all types of opinions so I can relate to different, um, walks of life and have a firm understanding of, um, you know, where, where everyone is coming from.

As a police organization, we need to be very apolitical, yet we need to have a firm understanding of what everybody’s potential agenda is Um, and then, um, the other types of, um, media that I like to consume is, is something that’s just very, um, I like fiction and mysteries and, and something that’s just completely, separate it and segued away from this entirely because I am a firm believer in wellness and creating balance in my life, because if I was completely just consumed with work, work, work, leadership, I could see myself getting a little bit too spun up and focused and not be able to, to, to relax. So having that, that balance and, um, in addition, um, ensuring that I spend time and, and, and having hobbies outside and, and friends in a community that aren’t just law enforcement and, and, and whatnot is really, I believe, um, helped me, um, sustain longevity in this career and ensuring balance.

Dennis Nayor: Yeah, what a, what a positive way to end this because we could do a podcast just on the wellness component and you’re right, you have to infuse it when you’re doing something as important and as high stress, potentially as tactical operations at, at the SWAT level and even a patrol level. You have to have things that you can go home, disconnect, have hobbies and interests outside of that.

And I really like that, that you present that to the listeners and viewers that having that type of reading material in your, um, uh, repertoire has a tremendous amount of value.

Jolie Macias (she/her): Absolutely. Thank you for having me, Dennis. Appreciate it.

Dennis Nayor: Absolutely. Thank you for being here. Madi’s going to come and close us out. Um, again, I can guarantee this podcast will have a lot of, um, uh, a lot of positive, uh, feedback from it. So thank you for your time and expertise.

Jolie Macias (she/her): Thank you.

Madi: Thank you for taking the time to meet the law enforcement heroes and leaders who are part of the MS LEPSL family. You can find more episodes of Blue Leadership on Facebook and YouTube. If you would like to learn more about the LEPSL program, visit us at criminaljustice.sandiego.edu.