The Police are mostly reactive not proactive. A crime must be committed or in the process before Police become involved. You or someone else must dial 911 then wait.
About the only time Police are being proactive is when they are covering a large crowd of people. Or sitting and waiting for someone to break the speed limit.
Not to mention when a crime is committed and police decide it isnât worth prosecuting. That happens a lot too.
âfill out a police report and someone will investigateâ
Thatâs because âproactive policingâ equates to a Police State.
In this country we are very cognizant of the line between the two although most people have varying opinions of where that line is.
If you live in a high crime neighborhood you probably would like to see more cops on the streets but if you live in a low crime area a heavy police presence will tend to make any law abiding citizen a bit nervous.
Stop, question, and frisk was a recent example of Proactive Policing that actually worked but was resoundingly rejected by the very people it was intended to help and billed by them as âPolice State Tacticsâ.
What definition are you using in order to conclude that proactive policing = police state? Surely, not this one.
from Proactive policing - Wikipedia
Elements
Proactive policing is closely related to the practice of community policing.[10] Community policingâs goal is âproblem solving.â Community policing emphasizes proactive enforcement that proposes street crime can be reduced through greater community involvement and integration between citizens and police. Community policing departments and officers must commit time to develop a âpartnershipâ with the community to: 1) Prevent and counter crime; 2) Maintain order; and 3) Reduce the fear of crime.[1] Police organization is decentralized with every police officer and detective having a neighborhood to patrol with agreed upon goals and objectives to solve. Police officers must feel integrated with the majority of the citizens of the community where they patrol, and that they perceive themselves as sharing similar values and beliefs so they are confident in their decision making ability. Each police officer must get out of their cars (not just drive by and grin and wave) to visit with citizens and businesses to learn the residents concerns and show theyâre a friend and protectorâin contrast to âstrict law enforcementâ or âreactive policingâ which doesnât view the citizens as customers.[1]
And seeing cops in my low crime area doesnât make the least bit nervous, that is one of the reasons it is a low crime area.
Cops cannot prevent crime unless it is a police state.
Justice is by definition reactive.
Want a perfect example of a slide into police state? Probable cause vs. Reasonable suspicion.
A police presence can reduce crime where they are commonly visible, but overall, it is a displacement of crime, not prevention. Just as the cop known to park behind the billboard will prevent most people from speeding on that stretch of road, it will not prevent those same people from speeding elsewhere.
Thereâs a small town I knew of in the '60s that kept and empty cop car parked about a mile from town on the right side of the highway going in from either direction. It was very effective in causing the speed limit through the town observed.
A smaller town just a few miles down the highway had only one stop lightâŚoften controlled in the night by a retired deputy sitting on his front porch as his son, a deputy sat on his motorcycle nearby.
Was thinkingâŚ"Italians? " but only for a second or two.
The reaction to it and labeling we keep seeing applied to it.
Just seeing cops on the street doesnât necessarily equate to a âheavy police presenceâ.
That would be suddenly seeing instead of just two cops patrolling a two or three block area on foot suddenly youâre seeing three or four times that many coordinated with an increase in patrol cars working the area.
Thatâs going to make anyone go, âhmmâ, and most folks would not appreciate it if it were maintained for a prolonged period of time.
I donât care how decent we are as citizens none of us appreciates being stopped for stupid stuff or contacted in ways we think are unnecessary.
Iâve seen examples of some towns using life-sized cardboard cops-on-motorcycles to achieve the same effect. 
If I lived somewhere with sky high murder rates theyâd be welcome to have a dozen cops circle my block 24/7 but I guess thatâs just me.
You have a lot more trust in the police than most minority communities do. When they see that kind of response they tend to get real bothered.
Only the criminals. Minority communities for the most part are usually asking for more police not less. Unless, it is a situation where the community is mostly minority and the police are mostly white. Or to put it another way, minorities in high crime areas want more policing, without racial bias.
Being proactive does not mean Police need to be overly intrusive. I have traveled a lot to Canada on business and pleasure. I have to give credit where credit is due. The Police in Canada has their act together.
I was at a Toronto Blue Jays game at Rogers Center with a friend. Two salty looking guys approached us and started demanding that we give them money. Out of the crowd of people, three Police Officers showed up. The situation was over before it even got started. The Police were very kind and apologized to us for any inconvenience.
We never even knew any Police were around. The Officers were walking around blended in with the crowd, hiding in plain sight you might say. They wore uniforms but they were just being part of the crowd. Walking around striking up a casual conversation, laughing just being normal citizens.
A lot of Police here in the States are Cowboys. A lot are rude and give the impression they just donât give a shit. Not all I might add but enough to where it gives Police a bad name.
Police presence in a lot of cities is seeing a Patrol Car driving down the street with the windows up.
Of course they did ⌠they are Canadian. 
They were responding to a crime in progress and you should expect a heavy police presence at any pro sporting event in N. America.
Not remotely the same thing Iâm talking about.
But I must disagree. The Police can protect the people if they go back to how Policing worked many years ago. I think they called them Beat Cops. This worked very well in cities. Most cities have done away with the Beat Cop.
Now the Police drive by with the windows up never paying much attention to whatâs going on around them.
The experience I had in Canada. If that happened in my city the Police may have never showed up.