Officer Chanda Dolsen has returned to her office from five days of ground defense training where, according to her, her head was repeatedly “smashed into the mat.”

On a Saturday morning, while a blizzard whips the city of Madison into a slushy froth, Dolsen cracks her neck at regular intervals to relieve the pain. It’s a perk of her position as the State Street and Capitol Square neighborhood officer that Dolsen can choose her own hours. And right then, aches, pains and bad weather aside, Dolsen is wrapped up in a case.

“They wanted me to write them a ticket,” Dolsen said, explaining that a Socialist group had set up a table and passed out information without a permit. “They really want to fight this case in court because I think they’re trying to say that freedom of speech should take a precedence over vending.”

Although she only started the position in October, Dolsen is full of these kinds of stories, enthusiastically invested in every encounter. While not a beat officer, she still tries to get out on the street as much as possible, networking with and serving as a liaison for the property owners, tenants, organizations, patrons and the homeless population.

“I am passionate about State Street,” says Dolsen, a veteran cop from Indiana who worked for two years as an officer on Madison’s east side. “It’s like the hallmark of Madison. It’s like the potpourri of people. From a police perspective, we definitely support it.”

While beat officers patrol the streets and the community police deal with alcohol-related cases, Dolsen gets calls on a mixed bag of issues including everything from vending licenses and restaurant sidewalk caf? regulations to store theft.

“I really work hard with businesses,” Dolsen says. “I’ll even run them copies of state law, what they can and can’t do. I can also talk about how to lay out their store so it’s not as conducive for theft.”

For all of the worry about theft, Dolsen says it happens on average about once every week. She adds some of the problem stems from the homeless population on State Street, which Dolsen deals with on a regular basis.

“I have a close relationship with the homeless population down here,” Dolsen says. “They are by far a big responsibility for me.”

Pulling a silver palm pilot from its case, Dolsen explains that it is an ongoing project, started by a retired officer, to catalog homeless individuals in the neighborhood. Pulling up a long alphabetical listing, Dolsen taps on one name, revealing the person’s picture, nickname and date of birth.

“It’s kind of my job to know who these people are, what they’re doing and where they’re at,” Dolsen says. “We learned a long time ago you can’t lump anybody together.”

As part of a citizen-sponsored program, Dolsen has begun giving gift cards for State Street businesses to homeless individuals as rewards for good behavior, staying sober and even as a way to introduce herself. The gift cards can purchase someone a sandwich or cup of coffee, Dolsen says, without risking that money will be spent on drugs or alcohol.

“It’s a really great ice breaker for me,” Dolsen says. “(It helps) just to kind of restore that dignity so they feel better about themselves. This is a holistic view on policing.”

While the gift card program is going well, Dolsen says many other concerns she frequently addresses are completely unrelated to homeless issues. Recently, some downtown businesses have complained of graffiti and “scratchiti,” words and images often etched into storefront windows and other glass surfaces.

“You tend to see it this time of year,” Dolsen says. “It’s one of those crimes that are so frustrating because hands down [businesses] are going to lose money.”

It’s just another way in which Dolsen is personally invested in the particular demands of her location. In her schedule, vandalism is to one day what parking issues, trespassing regulations and committee meetings are to the next. But this day, as she assembles a neighborhood watch poster and pops some popcorn for lunch with an eye on two computer screens, Dolsen has no misgivings.

“I love the challenges of State Street,” Dolsen says. “There is no other neighborhood in the city that I would want to be in.”