Recording microphones and audio-editing software and equipment aren’t a common sight around most police departments. However, Mountain View Police Sgt. Saul Jaeger and Shino Tanaka, the department’s social media and community coordinator have been regularly putting those tools to use.
Jaeger and Tanaka set up the “Silicon Valley Beat,” a podcast show available on the Mountain View Police blog, in late April 2014. As of Wednesday, Sept. 10, 16 “Silicon Valley Beat” episodes have been released. Jaeger and Tanaka said they try to record a new episode every week.
Tanaka, who Jaeger said came up with the idea for a podcast, said that she and Jaeger were looking for more creative ways to reach the public and inform residents on how the Mountain View Police Department functions.
“People weren’t really interested in hearing a traditional crime bulletin,” Tanaka said.
Topics Jaeger and Tanaka have covered in the podcast include parking in Mountain View during events at Levi’s Stadium and K9 officers in the police department. In one episode that Jaeger said “got a lot of play,” Jaeger and Tanaka interviewed then-Mountain View Police Chief Scott Vermeer before he retired.
Jaeger and Tanaka both said that the podcast is currently in a “pilot” stage. They said that if they determine the project to be an ineffective means of reaching the public, they would discontinue it.
“The way we run our unit is kind of like a start up project,” Jaeger said.
Tanaka said there is not a timetable for determining whether a project like the podcast would continue or be discontinued.
Jaeger and Tanaka said they were interested in determining ways that the podcast could be enhanced and improved. Jaeger said that they plan to incorporate video in some form into future podcasts, and pointed to the way the “Sarah and Vinnie Show” at radio station Alice 97.3FM operates with cameras as an example of the direction “Silicon Valley Beat” could proceed.
Podcast listener Dawn Endico said that she sees the “Silicon Valley Beat” as a professional quality podcast in terms of its production value. Endico also said that the podcast benefits from the positive energy of its hosts.
“They seem to do a good job,” Endico said. “They’re really upbeat.”
However, Endico also said that written blog posts would inform residents more extensively than podcast audio clips.
Tanaka said that a podcast could be considered often a more convenient means of obtaining information than reading, and that listeners could perform other tasks like cooking that they would not be possible with written content.
Jaeger said that in a future episode he and Tanaka might consider covering concert safety in light of the deadly shooting at the Wiz Khalifa concert in late August. He said that he and Tanaka keep a list of possible topics on the whiteboard of their office.
For the time being, according to Tanaka, the podcast gives her and Jaeger an excellent opportunity to reveal a different and unique perspective of the police department and how it operates.
The podcasts are available at mountainviewpoliceblog.com/category/podcasts.
Email Cooper Aspegren at caspegren@mv-voice.com
