The Los Angeles Police Department Harbor Division officers have recently started to be greeted every morning during roll call, where officers start their daily shift, by an expansive mural created by San Pedro artist Luis Sanchez, that serves as a visual representation of all the communities that it serves. The mural also depicts a few hundred names of the division’s officers on either side of the work.
Capt. Brent McGuyre of the Harbor Division, told Random Lengths that he was on a committee that was working with Sanchez on the mural. And Officer Brent Bodkin was the one who led the charge from the Harbor Division to create the mural.
“I know that’s a little outside his normal range of being an artist and utilizing his own vision,” said the Captain. “We had a general framework of what we wanted to put in the mural and then he came back with an initial design. We gave him some feedback and then it all came together.”
Capt. McGuyre said community reaction has been really good.
“[The mural] was designed to be a morale booster and also a way to connect our retirees or former employees,” he said. “So, it’s really our way of leaving our mark on Harbor Division. We had some folks who had retired or hadn’t worked here in some 20 years who reached out to us and asked for their name to be put on the wall. We had some officers whose dads worked at Harbor and now they work at Harbor and got their names put up next to their dad’s. It is a way to connect past, present and future officers who give their lives to serve the public down here.”
The department gathered community input so they would get a mural that “really did capture the Harbor Division for the officers but also the community.” They asked community members, especially in Wilmington, what they could put in the mural to represent Wilmington, because it was important for the Harbor Division to have representation from all the communities it serves.
“It was truly a collaborative effort between a lot of entities, Capt. McGuyre said. “I thought it came together beautifully. It’s a mural that captures all of the area.”
Harbor Division even had a first run of autographed prints, signed by Sanchez, which Capt. McGuyre believes have sold out — or nearly sold out.
“Once we sell out, we may sell some non-autographed ones and if there’s more demand we’ll probably ask Luis to sign some more for us,” he said.