Commission On Accreditation For Law Enforcement Agencies - CALEA Assessors

CALEA Assessors

CALEA Assessors are contractual employees who follow the policies and procedures of the Commission. CALEA Assessors must have the ability to evaluate public safety management policies, procedures, practices, and activities. It is important for an assessor to have a firm understanding of modern public safety personnel, administrative, legal, and operational concepts and be able to interact, at a peer level, with the assessed agency CEO and command staff.

While on assignment, CALEA Assessors must exemplify the highest levels of professionalism at all times and foster a non-adversarial climate. The CALEA Philosophy concerning assessments is “accountability with reasonable assistance.” As the “eyes and ears” of the Commission, assessors must maintain objectivity and report on the agency’s ability to comply with the requisite number of applicable standards.

For every accreditation on-site assessment, one assessor is designated as the team leader. Team leaders must hold a senior level executive or management position in their agency. Team leaders are selected from the assessor pool based on their performance, the recommendations of their past team leaders and assessed agencies, and a CALEA Staff review. Team leader certification requires additional CALEA training, as well as maintaining an active assessor certificate. Re-certification is required every three years for assessor and team leader.