Pittsburgh to pursue cultural competency training for public safety

Pittsburgh will spend $50,000 to provide cultural competency training under a proposal Mayor Bill Peduto’s office introduced Monday.

The city and Peduto’s Office of Equity plan to partner with Pittsburgh-based Cultural Humility and Equity Collaborative to create a program for the city’s Department of Public Safety.

The idea is to train police, fire and other public safety workers about how to best deal with the city’s immigrant and refugee population, the city said.

The training will provide an overview of the immigrant and refugee populations in each of the city’s neighborhoods and work to help police officers and others understand and use appropriate cultural responses when responding to calls from these communities, the city said.

People from these communities who live in each of the neighborhoods have different backgrounds, Azi Bloch, founder of the Cultural Humility and Equity Collaborative said.

“Brentwood is different from Squirrel Hill and it’s different from Lawrenceville,” Bloch said.

Through the training, police and public safety officials will be able to build more trustworthy relationships with the people they serve, she said.

“We are glad to be working with a local, community-based vendor to develop a cultural competency training,” Peduto said.

The curriculum that will be developed will respond to Pittsburgh’s “unique immigrant, refugee and international communities,” Peduto said.

“It’s important that their voices are heard and reflected in this training and it’s important that our fist responders get the training they need to feel prepared to help and serve immigrant and refugee individuals and families,” the mayor said. “We hope that this will continue to build trust between first responders and immigrant refugee communities so that all of our communities feel welcome and safe.”

Councilman Corey O’Connor introduced legislation to fund the program Monday and it met unanimous initial approval.

The hope is to develop the curriculum next year and have it “up and running” by summer, Bloch said.

Public safety officials have worked with the Peduto administration to develop the training, spokesman Chris Togneri said.

“The goal throughout the Public Safety department is to build bridges and connect with our communities, and we anticipate that this training will help us achieve those goals,” he said.