Irwindale Police Sgt. Rudy Gatto was at the Starbucks drive-through when the young woman at the window noticed the pink patch on his uniform. She asked about it and then called her co-workers to the window as well.
“ Just the stimulating conversation with the community is incredible,” says Gatto, who added that this particular conversation occurred within the first hour of Irwindale Police officers starting to wear their pink patches in the community in 2015.“ It’ s really staggering to think the kind of impact it’ s having on the community.”
In addition to raising funds for breast cancer research, this kind of dialogue is one of the Pink Patch Project’ s key goals. According to the Pink Patch Project, about one in eight women will be diagnosed with invasive breast cancer in her lifetime and breast cancer is the second leading cause of cancer death among women.
“ We want to find a cure, we want to fight cancer and raise awareness,” says Irwindale Police Chief Anthony Miranda, who got the basic idea of wearing pink patches as a way to support October’ s Breast Cancer Awareness Month from the Seal Beach Police Department, which did this in 2013.
In 2015, Irwindale Police developed a more expanded version of the idea and had a goal of raising $ 10,000 by selling the patches in the community. They doubled their target goal by raising $ 20,000.
“ It’ s very, very personal and the energy is incredible that [ participating agencies ] bring to the project,” says Miranda.
With such great success, Miranda decided to go even bigger this year, inviting the Los Angeles County Police Chiefs’ Association to participate. The participants list has grown consistently( at 71 agencies as of Oct. 14), including departments all over California, and even several out-ofstate agencies as well.
“ It’ s really kind of a collaborative effort between all these agencies,” says Gatto.
Many agencies have really taken the idea and run with it, according to Gatto. Some stick to the pink patches, while others sell T-shirts, plush animals, license plate frames, challenge coins, etc.
One agency even received a donated women’ s diamond ring to sell raffle tickets for and give proceeds to the Pink Patch Project Fund for Cancer. Each agency selects a local breast cancer group to support and runs its fundraising efforts independently – determining marketing, promotions and sales on a local level. Each agency also handles its own record keeping and works directly with the local organization receiving the donations.
There has been collaboration among agencies – including a Pink Patch Project booth at the recent Los Angeles County Fair, which sold patches and T-shirts from several different agencies and collectively raised $ 30,000 in just four weeks.
WINTER 2016 | California Police Chief 23