Citizens Academies and Background Checks

<p>An earlier post of mine discussed citizens academies as an investment by local governments in various forms of community capital. In a conversation with a coordinator of one of these programs the question of background checks came up. Should applicants to citizens academies be subjected to some kind of background check before being allowed to participate? How many programs are currently doing such screens, and if so, why? I posed this question to program coordinators and the results are worth considering. And the implications extend beyond  citizens academies but also, potentially, to advisory boards and other official community volunteer capacities.</p> <p></p> <p>I posed this question recently to a list of public information officers in North Carolina (many of which serve as citizens academy coordinators) along with a list of program contacts for approximately 85 citizens academies from across the U.S. that I maintain (note, there is some overlap between the two lists).</p> <p>I received 53 responses from a wide-variety of cities and counties, both large and small, from 14 different states (23 were from North Carolina). Of those 53 responses, 47 (or 89%) report that they do not perform background checks of program applicants or participants. Of the six that do, two reported that they do so because the program includes classes with the police department that involve ride-alongs and/or involve firearms, and thus they need to do background checks for safety reasons. Another respondent reported that they only perform background checks on participants if they choose (i.e., opt-in) to do a ride-along with police (thus they [...]</p>