Page 59 - 01A_CL7_SEP21.indd

Not only an officer, but also a father
After a long 12-hour shift, 15th District Officer Edward Whitak- er Jr. wants nothing more than to go home to his 11-year-old son, Edward III, 6-year-old daughter, Chelsea, and wife, Chanell.
“They meet me at the back door,” Whitaker relayed. "My daugh- ter's got my leg, my son's got my arms. I’m welcomed home.”
Whitaker’s family has a few rules — play three card games a day and eat dinner together every night while watching “America Says” on the Game Show Network. They also go out to eat at Pizza Hut on Wednesdays and get Chinese food on Fridays.
“It’s the traditions we do as a family,” Whitaker explained. “My parents did it with me and my sister. I want to carry on that legacy with my kids because I’ve seen what it does for the family.”
It’s these traditions that help Whitaker be the best father he can be. And it’s his continuous success being a father and officer that earned him the Illinois Fatherhood Initiative 2021 Community Father of the Year award, the same prestigious award that former President Barack Obama received in 2006. Seventh District Offi- cer James Vittori was given the 2020 award.
Whitaker’s colleagues and the Austin community nominated him for the award, and his son submitted an essay detailing the kind of father Whitaker is.
“I didn’t know until we actually had to read it,” Whitaker re- called. “That was the first time I heard it, and it was really nice.”
Whitaker extends his fatherly attributes to other children as well. He is a mentor at the Chicago West Side Police and Youth Sports Conference, which has 200 kids, including his son, and helps to develop safe, healthy activities for children and families in underresourced areas.
“I am a product of the west side of Chicago,” Whitaker ex- pressed. “All my success was attributed to the experience and mentors I had along the way. So being a police officer, my legacy is actually being a person that provides that example.”
As a mentor, Whitaker encourages the children to stay positive,
keep working hard and believe in themselves.
“I like to tell them that sports mirrors life,” Whitaker clarified. “I
tell them that life is filled with ups and downs, peaks and valleys, and it teaches you how to respond to failure and adversity.”
Whitaker admits that police officers didn’t have the best repu- tation when he was growing up, but he’d like to change that, start- ing with the youth. And his son can personally attest to his father breaking that stigma.
“He sees it firsthand,” Whitaker conveyed. “Of a loving father, loving dad, loving brother, things like that. So he’s able to portray that message to other kids. Like, ‘Not my dad. No, all police aren’t bad.’”
Whitaker is not just a law enforcement officer. He’s Edward III’s role model. He’s Chelsea’s dad. He’s Chanell’s high school sweet- heart. And he is an outstanding example of being able to do it all.
“We are living the dream,” Whitaker declared. “Gotta live life to the fullest.”
Lights, camera, action for 15th District seniors
The 15th District Senior Film Series has been four years in the making.
It started with Sergeant Shawn Sisk of the community policing office, who came up with the idea to show films that had Chicago roots to the seniors in the community. Back then, the group had fewer than 10 people.
“He organized it with a couple of active seniors in our com- munity,” said Hank Kline, the 15th District community policing officer who took the baton from Sisk and is now overseeing the event series. “We show films that were either made in Chicago, Chicago-involved or about Chicago personalities.”
Hank tries to show 10 diverse films a year to the seniors. In July, they played “A Most Beautiful Thing,” a documentary from 2020 about the first all-Black high school men’s rowing team.
“The rowers of this team get together 20 years later as adults,” Kline described. “And they row in Lincoln Park with Chicago po- lice officers, to sort of bridge that gap between these kids who grew up in a gang-infested neighborhood on the west side.”
As part of the event, the officers bring in a speaker to talk to the seniors after the film. For “A Most Beautiful Thing,” Kline was able to get two of the officers that acted in the film to speak.
“They don’t just want to come in and watch a movie,” Kline re- layed. “We’re making really interesting connections between the city, the film and the group. And the seniors really want that.”
The seniors loved the film series so much that they took it upon themselves to raise donations for better video and sound equip- ment to watch the films at the station. And the event grew to the
point where 35 people, and others on the waitlist, will sign up to watch the films.
Kline believes that it’s important to create an environment where older residents can feel comfortable enough to interact with each other and officers, and more importantly, stimulate their minds.
“This is a group that is often overlooked,” Kline explained. “These are people who want to stay active and want to have in- tellectually stimulating cultural experiences. And they have a lot to offer.”
CHICAGO LODGE 7 ■ SEPTEMBER 2021 59