At just 19 years old, a young Steven Heider started working as a public safety dispatcher with the Town of Colonie Police Department. It was 1973, a challenging time for police departments still reeling from the Vietnam War and racial unrest of the ’60s. However, crime was uncommon in the town and most officers only fit the role of a part-time job.
As a Colonie resident for most of his life, Heider felt right at home with the department, immediately beginning to secure relationships that would eventually lead to a full-time job with the department.
“(The department) proved to me in a very short time it was an organization that wanted to move forward,” Heider said. “It was very progressive in adopting to new things, ways of investigation, ways to treat employees.”
Forty-one years later, Heider has never left the police department and has moved up its ranks to become the fifth chief of police in the town. Just last week, he took on his newest responsibility as the president of the New York State Association of Chiefs of Police, a voluntary agency created to help serve the people of New York, maintain law and order, as well as exercising democracy in government, a role Heider was eager to fill.
“At the end of the day, I still enjoy coming to work as much as I did in 1973 when I started. That’s a beautiful thing,” Heider said.
A graduate of both Colonie Central High School and Russell Sage College, Heider said he knew he wanted to join law enforcement as a kid. Since his time with the department, Heider has worked in numerous fields, including being in charge of narcotics as well as detectives, which he said was the “most exciting part” of his career because he had control over how every case was handled. He has had a long list of community outreach activities, including serving on the Amber Alert Committee, Juvenile Justice Task Force, as well as conducting seminars at Siena College and The University at Albany on child abuse and drug and alcohol issues.
Heider said, as chief, he knows he is making an impact on the department and community, whether good or bad, and does not hold that responsibility lightly.
“You’re in the position to create change and create an environment that is good for your employees but also good for the ‘mother ship’ – what I call the town. And to make sure you have the ability to allow people to grow within the confines of police rules,” Heider said. “We’ve done this over the years, we’ve been very progressive.”
While he’s been sworn in as chief, Colonie was ranked the safest community in the country, twice, and was listed in the top 15 safest communities in the countries for the last 13 years. Over the past 41 years, there has only been one unsolved homicide.
Heider said while “very few people walk out of here smiling,” he keeps a stern focus on treating “the bad guy fairly and the good guys with the most amount of grace that we can.”
Over the years, his work has paid off.
“I still get phone calls today from people I can barely remember thanking me for something I did 20 years ago,” Heider said.
Heider said other than newer, more technology-driven crimes like identity theft, overall crime hasn’t changed since he started; burglaries and sex crimes still exist. Yet he credited having an overall safe community with the open-minded department and town, noting “great administrators, great supervisors” and strong EMS and volunteers departments make it all work.
The progressiveness Heider takes pride in revolves around good communication with surrounding towns and cities, too.
“If I needed people real quick (from another department), by the time I put down the phone, there’d be people on their way to the Town of Colonie. That doesn’t happen in every community,” Heider said. “We are blessed in the Capital District in that we have police that get along; we help each other.”
Colonie was also one of the first police departments in the area to implement ideas like video-taped confessions and “use-of-force forms,” under Heider’s command.
Heider said the biggest change since he started has been the use of technology within the field. The department spends about half a million dollars on technology-related requirements. Now, with the “CSI effect,” DNA is always required at a trial and people expect crimes to be solved and taken care of quicker.
“It takes time to solve crimes,” Heider said. “New York state laws are archaic. They take years to change. Many times our laws are years behind technology, yet our victims don’t realize that. It’s a challenge for us.”
As the new president of the New York State Association of Chiefs of Police for a full year, Heider will assume several new roles such as helping to maintain “professional recognition, uniformity of operation” and “the advancement of the general welfare of the police profession.” The association aims to develop a more effective and efficient law enforcement and criminal justice system, while also advocating for police rights.
“New York is looked a lot as a leader. We aim to maintain that position in the law enforcement community,” Heider said.
Chief John Grebert, executive director of the association, once worked on the Colonie Police Department and has known Heider since 1975. As Heider assumes the new role as president while also maintaining his position as chief, Grebert said he has no doubt in his mind that Heider is up for the task.
“You have to be willing to take on a whole new set of responsibilities and challenges to do this. You will have an impact on the role of police chiefs around New York State,” Grebert said. “I couldn’t be happier that he assumes the top post in our association.”
While Heider said he misses working directly on the field, he has no plans to retire and his job has fulfilled his expectations “and then some.”
“It was a dream job I wanted initially, and it’s a dream job I still have today. I walk out this door with no regrets,” Heider said.