10/07/2026
National Coffee with a Cop Day started with a simple problem. Most people only ever met the police on the worst day of their week.
In 2011, Chief Keith Kauffman and John Dixon of the Hawthorne Police Department in California tried something different. They set up at a local coffee shop, with no agenda and no speeches, and let residents walk up and ask whatever they wanted. By 2016 the idea had spread to all 50 states.
It is now held on the first Wednesday of October every year, which this year is October 7.
The format has not changed, because it does not need to. A table, a cup of coffee, and time to talk about the things that never come up during a call. Parking. School traffic. Why the sirens were out on Tuesday night.
Members of this association know the most useful conversations rarely happen in an emergency.