Emergency Services Units

An Emergency Services Unit (ESU) is generally described as a unit within a police agency designated for meeting the specialized needs of the agency in terms of providing the ability for special enforcement or investigations, or a specialized or unique response on behalf of the agency most commonly regarding tactical operations, rescues, riots, hostage and rescue operations, and a variety of other high-risk emergency operations requiring a specialized tactical response, specialized training, and specialized equipment.

In defining an ESU within a police department, a foundation must be created in order to place such a definition in its proper context. In the United States, there are more than 17,000 state and local police agencies. The large majority of these are smaller agencies. Approximately 85% of these 17,000 agencies employ fewer than 50 officers. Excluding state agencies and sheriff's departments, there are approximately 12,666 local police agencies as of the year 2000. Each police agency, depending on its size and the community it serves, covers a wide range of tasks and functions.

The main components of modern policing regularly encompass a number of basic, key functions, such as uniformed patrol (including responding to calls for service); criminal investigations; drug enforcement; prevention and outreach programs; administration; internal investigations and inspections; and technical support (e.g., communications, records and property management). Generally, these functions may be divided into four common or basic components: patrol services, special services, technical services, and administration. A special services command or bureau denotes more specialized operational tasks.

Under the special services command, medium- to large-size agencies, generally considered to be those[Page 169] employing more than 125 sworn officers, might commonly operate a number of specialized units. These units may be full-time or part-time, because the officers involved in these functions may be assigned to other functions as well. In smaller departments, officers regularly assigned to patrol duties may manage these functions in addition to their regularly assigned patrol duties. In larger departments, full-time units may accomplish many of these functions. These include, but are not limited to, criminal investigations; gang intelligence; community crime prevention; drug education in schools; drug enforcement; juvenile delinquency enforcement; child abuse investigations; missing children; drunk driving; domestic violence; repeat offenders; bias-related crime; dignitary protection; special events; SWAT; SRT or ERT (special response team, emergency response team, or ESU); directed patrol; traffic enforcement; bicycle and/or motorcycle unit; mounted patrol; sniper unit; negotiation or critical incident team; building collapses; search-and-rescue missions; riot control; and victim assistance.

Agencies often categorize these functions by unit and program. As such, programs that address juvenile delinquency, school-based education programs, police athletic league or police boys and girls clubs, victim assistance, and related prevention programs may be incorporated under a form of community outreach or community services. Missing-person investigations and child abuse investigations, as well as domestic violence investigations, may also be connected to this category, or they may be organized with an investigative unit under criminal investigations, along with investigations involving major crimes such as homicide, rape, robbery, burglary, serious assaults, and major theft and fraud cases. As noted, all of these tasks may be categorized under a special services type of command.

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