Filled with selfies, emojis and hashtags galore, the Benicia Police Department have been showing a different side of themselves lately. This new side of the police the community has been seeing might be because the Benicia Police Department launched a new Instagram account on June 9.
Irma Widjojo, the management analyst for the Benicia Police Department, said starting the Instagram account was a natural progression in the department’s efforts to reach out to the community.
“We think that Instagram is another great tool in our tool belt,” she said. “We also think that it reaches a demographic that we may or not may be able to reach through Facebook and Twitter. I think that it reaches a younger audience in general, and we just think it’s another great community engagement tool that we’re really excited to have it.”
Currently, the Benicia Instagram account has 55 followers and follows 22 accounts since launching less than a week ago. Widjojo thinks the Instagram account will not only try to reach the Benicia community, but showcase the city and police department to the rest of the internet. She said the Instagram will consists of posts that give a glimpse to the community of what the police do and how they interact with the community.
“Nowadays police enforcement encompasses so many things,” Widjojo said. “We go out and do all different things just not investigating cases or doing arrests. We are the community and the community is a part of us. The chief always says that we have 28,000 police officers because every single person in our city is a police officer. We all help each other.”
The Benicia Police Department also has a Facebook page and Twitter account that have been running for nearly a year and a half now. The Facebook page was launched in 2015, and the Twitter page followed suit in 2016. Widjojo says those social media pages have met great success within the community since launching.
“The community is appreciating we are sharing things with them,” Widjojo said. “I think they are appreciating what we’re doing in terms of law enforcement, but with other stuff like the community events and engagements that we do that they might have not seen before Facebook and Twitter.”
Benicia Police have a social media team consisting of five members that come together and brainstorm how to best engage the community. Widjojo, who’s a part of the social media team, says the group looks at the latest trends and apps that could be a benefit to the police department’s goals. The group has already had minor discussions about starting a BPD Snapchat, but Widjojo said it might take a while for that to arrive.
“We just hope that if anyone has any suggestions on how we can improve our community engagement effort, please let us know. We are all ears.” Widjojo said “We want to know how we can best reach out to everyone in the community.”
The Benicia Police Department can be found and followed on Instagram at @Beniciapd.

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