The La Plata Police Department earned national accreditation from the Commission on Accreditation for Law Enforcement Agencies for the third consecutive time on July 25, a distinction held by only a small fraction of police agencies nationwide.
CALEA’s Board of Commissioners granted the reaccreditation during the organization’s conference in Omaha, Nebraska, following a multi-year self-assessment and site-based review of the department’s policies, training, operations, community engagement and accountability practices. La Plata Police Chief Matthew Norris called the designation more than a periodic award. “CALEA accreditation is not simply an award earned every few years; it is an operational roadmap that guides every aspect of our organization,” Norris said. “It requires commitment from every member of our Department, the support of our community, and collaboration with our stakeholders. Maintaining accreditation ensures that the La Plata Police Department continues to operate under nationally recognized best practices while providing the highest level of service, professionalism, and accountability to the citizens we are privileged to serve.”
The department was first accredited in 2018 and earned reaccreditation in 2022, meaning this year’s award extends a streak that now spans La Plata’s participation in CALEA’s four-year accreditation cycle since it first pursued the credential. That cycle requires accredited agencies to complete four annual remote, web-based file reviews followed by a full on-site assessment in the fourth year, a process the department has now completed three times. At the time of its 2022 reaccreditation, then-Chief Carl Schinner noted that La Plata held the distinction of being Maryland’s smallest law enforcement agency to hold CALEA accreditation.
CALEA accreditation remains relatively rare among the roughly 18,000 law enforcement agencies operating in the United States; some CALEA-accredited agencies have cited figures suggesting only around 4% of the nation’s police departments hold the credential at any given time. The commission, created in 1979 through a partnership of four major law enforcement associations — the International Association of Chiefs of Police, the National Organization of Black Law Enforcement Executives, the National Sheriffs’ Association and the Police Executive Research Forum — requires participating agencies to demonstrate compliance with hundreds of professional standards covering areas from use-of-force policy to records management and community engagement.
Department officials credited the accreditation effort to a broad group of staff, including Accreditation Manager Jacquelyn DeSoto and Major Michael Payne, both of whom have been involved in the department’s CALEA process across multiple accreditation cycles, along with the department’s sworn officers and professional staff. The announcement also thanked La Plata residents, businesses, elected officials and community partners for their continued support, framing the achievement as a shared accomplishment rather than solely an internal one.
Supporters of the CALEA process argue that accreditation provides tangible operational benefits beyond the credential itself, including standardized policies that give new leadership a clear framework to follow, reduced liability exposure and, in some cases, measurable improvements in response times and service delivery. Because the accreditation process is voluntary and requires ongoing compliance rather than a one-time review, agencies that maintain accreditation over multiple cycles — as La Plata has now done — are generally seen within the profession as demonstrating sustained institutional commitment to the standards rather than a single successful audit.
La Plata’s continued accreditation comes as the department, like many local law enforcement agencies, works to build public trust and transparency amid broader national scrutiny of policing practices. CALEA’s standards include specific requirements around use-of-force reporting, internal affairs procedures and public complaint processes, areas that have drawn increased attention from both community advocates and law enforcement professional associations in recent years.
The department’s next CALEA review cycle will begin immediately, with the first of four annual file reviews expected within the coming year ahead of another full site-based assessment scheduled for 2030.
La Plata’s police department, which serves the roughly 10,000 residents of Charles County’s seat, operates as a relatively small municipal agency compared with the county-level Charles County Sheriff’s Office that patrols surrounding unincorporated areas. Municipal departments the size of La Plata’s face a steeper relative burden in pursuing CALEA accreditation, since the process demands roughly the same volume of policy documentation and file review regardless of an agency’s staffing level, a factor department leaders have pointed to when framing the accreditation as a notable achievement for an agency of the town’s size.
