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A Message from the President

By Captain Amira Eppolito

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“The individual members and collective strength of our organization have removed significant barriers in the last 100 years and will continue to accomplish significant strides to ensure women are valued and empowered within law enforcement.”

As we celebrate the 100th anniversary of the Los Angeles Women Police Officers and Associates (LAWPOA) in 2025, I want to recognize this as a mixed blessing. The goal of every non-profit is to accomplish its mission, therefore ceasing to exist. While countless improvements have been made in our historically male-dominated field, we are still celebrating too many “firsts” indicating that we are not yet where we should be. Our advocacy began with a fight to be recognized as police officers and to serve in a rank beyond sergeant. While women have achieved almost every rank and been represented in almost every coveted specialized assignment, they are still challenged and face criticism for their selections and promotions. Our continued mantra has been that we didn’t come this far, to get this far.

As your president, the strategic initiatives that I plan to prioritize are as follows:

  1. Celebrate the 100th Anniversary of LAWPOA, honoring the history and growth in the last hundred years.
  2. Foster the sisterhood of women in law enforcement by working more with collaborative organizations to accomplish our mission.
  3. Expand our training and growth opportunities, specific to women in law enforcement, increasing our training courses and offering luncheon seminars for relevant topics.
  4. Advocate and obtain paid maternity sick time for Sworn Women for 6-8 weeks.
  5. Increase our membership and revenue to advance our projects and increase wellness.

Your support as an advocate or as a member is needed to accomplish our mission to recruit, retain, support, and advance women in law enforcement. Inclusivity is our deepest value, proving that you do not have to be one of us to stand with us. Feel free to reach out to us so that we can work together collaboratively.

Our Mission: To Strengthen, Unite & Raise the Profile 
of Women in Law Enforcement
Learn About LAWPOA

Member Development

Member development is the one deliverable objective that will cause a person who is unsure about joining a professional organization or advocacy group to re-think and perhaps even join. The stories of successful member development spread like wildfire. But member development is more than passing the written or the oral; it must be about preparing our members to lead in the future to expand our bench for the future; it is about succession planning and mentorship. It’s about learning from successes and failures, and ultimately helping our members achieve their full potential.

Hear From Our Members

  • LAWPOA Made Me Who I Am Today

    The thoughtful leadership and care of LAWPOA has made this big-city agency feel small and connected. I know that I always have the resources and help that I need to succeed. If it were not for LAWPOA, I would not have been able to grow my career the way that I have.

    - LAPD Lieutenant
/
Recruitment and Retention

We must always find better ways to recruit and retain talent – both to optimize the LAWPOA membership and to drive our commitment to better policing. At LAWPOA, better recruitment and retention means more talent, diversity, and a stronger voice when facing critical issues. To this end, we have broadened our membership categories to include active, reserve, retired, non-sworn, civilian, legacy supporters (surviving family and friends), and most importantly, students.

Retention is a serious issue facing women in policing. Women, in general, continually find themselves at a disadvantage in the job hunt. LAWPOA should lead the way on innovative and non-traditional initiatives to retain and increase our talent.

Increased Representation at All Ranks and Positions

This is critical and tied firmly to each of the other initiatives. The only rank and position where we should settle for one position is the chief of police. But even for assignments where there are minimal opportunities, we should be preparing our membership to be competitive. It should never come as a surprise that our members are sought out and recruited for new positions, both inside and outside our organization.

While we should be proud of and celebrate our historic appointments, there is no reason why we should not plan for and expect more. LAWPOA is working on a number of important actions including a type of succession planning that would make it difficult for election boards or appointing authorities to pass over a member. Long before a vacancy exists, members should make a practice of preparing a pool of candidates. It must be a priority to ensure that we promote a culture for inclusivity and support women officers when opportunities for promotion and rank become available.

Community Engagement

Community engagement is perhaps the most non-traditional goal of our organization. Many women graduating from law enforcement academies today were not even born when we marched proudly across that field. It has been said, “it is hard to be what you cannot see.” The women graduating today likely saw someone in uniform to inspire them, just like some of us did. I wonder how many young women cannot imagine themselves in law enforcement because they have not seen someone who looks like them in uniform.

We must all work together to continue to prioritize community engagement. It will build relationships for the future. We don’t know what the LAWPOA of the 2030s and the 2040s will look like but we must take the long view and strategically plan to help craft it. As many of you know, we partner with other organizations to help young girls and young women empower themselves and build confidence to “climb that hill.” In doing so, we are opening doors to long-lasting relationships with our community.

I’m proud that this is your organization. We know we cannot fight every battle but when we choose to take a stand for change or against injustice, we will make every effort and tap every resource to strengthen, unite and raise the profile of women in law enforcement.

Committed to Our Community

  • Attend Social Events, Mixers and Meetings
  • Host an Annual Symposium for Training & Networking
  • Participate in Local Charity Events & Organizations
  • Dedicated to Continued Recruitment
Helping Open Doors for Members & Officers
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Interested in 
Learning More?

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