The minnesota law enforcement accreditation program (mnleap ) was initiated in 2024

The Department of Justice Community Oriented Policing Program awarded the Minnesota Chiefs of Police Association, Inc. $250,000 on October 1, 2025, under the Public Safety Partnership and Community Policing Grants program (CFDA 16.710).

The award funds an accreditation policy consultant position to support the Minnesota Law Enforcement Accreditation Program (MNLEAP). The consultant will assist Minnesota tribal police departments and smaller, rural, or underfunded law enforcement agencies in identifying policy gaps, drafting and finalizing policy manual language, and completing the accreditation process to achieve national best practices standards. The consultant will provide capacity to underfunded agencies comparable to better-resourced jurisdictions, enabling full participation in MNLEAP.

Performance runs through September 30, 2027, with place of performance in Mounds View, Minnesota. This award represents phase of a multi-year MNLEAP development effort. The Minnesota Chiefs of Police Association has received three prior Project Grants and one Cooperative Agreement totaling approximately $548,316 since fiscal year 2023 under the same program, funding an accreditation specialist position (expanded from part-time to full-time), an electronic public safety platform for program administration, assessor training development, microgrants to smaller agencies, and policy consultation services targeting tribal and underfunded departments.

Mnleap will engage additional agencies and begin an organized recruitment phase of our minnesota tribal police departments, there are anticipated needs for these agencies to have policy drafting assistance. Through this project mnleap will fund the services of an accreditation policy consultant. This mnleap team member will have the capacity to assist agencies identify, draft and finalize gaps in their policy manuals. If needed, the consultant can propose draft language to fill the gaps and assist in the accreditation process. The goal of the project is to have law enforcement achieve a level of national best practices. If gaps in policy manuals are delaying the accreditation process for smaller, rural or underfunded agencies then IT seems counter intuitive to the goal of accreditation. The policy consultant will help put smaller agencies on the same staffing level as other agencies and keep them fully engaged in our mnleap program.