Debbie Hatzieleftheriadis holds her Black Excellence on the Hill award. Photo by Eli Pekelny
Everything fell into place after Debbie Hatzieleftheriadis saw an ad in the paper.
The ad was recruiting people for the Brookline Police Department. At the time, the mother of five was coaching her kids’ sports teams and serving as the president of Brookline High School’s Parent Teacher Organization.
“I thought, ‘Maybe I could do it,’” Hatzieleftheriadis said. “I didn’t take it seriously.”
After passing the police entrance exam and becoming an officer in 1998, Hatzieleftheriadis participated in a leadership initiative for high schoolers, led the anti-drug DARE program and ran a youth basketball camp.
“I loved my job,” Hatzieleftheriadis said. “I absolutely loved it.”
Hatzieleftheriadis, who retired in 2014 following a back injury, made town history as Brookline’s first Black female police officer, an accolade that would pave the road to her receiving the 2026 Black Excellence on the Hill award.
The award honored over 100 Black trailblazers in February, all nominated by representatives and senators from across Massachusetts. Hatzieleftheriadis was nominated by State Rep. Tommy Vitolo, whose district includes part of Brookline.
“Debbie has paved the way for a new set of police officers who represent a far broader spectrum of people in our community,” Vitolo said. “She’s since retired from the police force, but she hasn’t retired from contributing to our town.”
The 64-year-old currently serves as a town Constable, a Town Meeting member, and a Parks and Recreation Commissioner. At one point, Hatzieleftheriadis drove buses for the Senior Center.
Moreover, she is the former president of Friends of Larz Anderson Park, a local group that defends and highlights Hatzieleftheriadis’s favorite park.
“Anything that I do, I don’t do it for the praise,” Hatzieleftheriadis said. “I do it because I care.”
How she came to be
As a young girl, Hatzieleftheriadis lived in Boston before moving to Brookline. The daughter of a Black father and a white mother, Hatzieleftheriadis described Boston as having “a lot of racial tension.”
When Hatzieleftheriadis’ single mother heard about the quality of the schools in Brookline, the family moved into a rent-controlled apartment in Brookline Village.
In kindergarten, Hatzieleftheriadis met Tracey Barney. To this day, Barney considers themselves to be “besties.”
“Everybody knows Debbie, and everybody loves her,” Barney said. “They think she’s a wonderful person. You never hear anybody say anything about her ever.”
In high school, Hatzieleftheriadis played basketball, softball and, above all else, soccer. She called herself an “all-scholastic, all-American soccer player.”
She graduated in 1980 and was inducted to the Brookline High School Athletic Hall of Fame in 2024 for her achievements in sports. Now she’s on the board that selects the inductees for the BHS Athletic Hall of Fame.
These days, Hatzieleftheriadis’ sports of choice are yoga and weightlifting.
“It took me a little while to embrace the slower, meditative stuff, because I’ve always been really busy,” Hatzieleftheriadis said. “It gives me that opportunity to slow down and really rest and really cherish my body. I’m used to beating it up.”
Hatzieleftheriadis isn’t the only athlete — or public servant — in her family. Two of her five children are firefighters. One of her eight grandchildren plays hockey at BHS.
“I go to all his games,” Hatzieleftheriadis said with pride.
Hatzieleftheriadis’ second eldest son, Harry Hatzieleftheriadis, is one of the firefighters in the family. He also owns a pizza shop called Ziggy’s in Brighton. Harry said he and his family members have always known about Hatzieleftheriadis’ selflessness.
“She can’t sit still,” Harry said. “Whether it’s the Town Meeting, whether it’s PTO stuff, whether it’s working at the Senior Center, she’s always doing stuff that is not self-serving… That’s really what makes her so special.”
Family is important to Hatzieleftheriadis. That’s why, she said, it hurts when she sees them targeted because of their ethnicity.
Diversity in the police force
Like other members of her family, Hatzieleftheriadis has experienced racial profiling. When she was a kid, people would clutch their bags as she walked by. Sometimes people would even follow her around stores.
“When you’re a person of color, you have to work harder, and that’s just a fact,” Hatzieleftheriadis said. “We face things that white people don’t face.”
When George Floyd was killed by a police officer in Minneapolis in 2020, Hatzieleftheriadis had already retired. She said that she wished she could have been able to help address the distrust between civilians and police that continues to this day.
“There are no good police officers that agree with what happened with George Floyd or with police brutality,” Hatzieleftheriadis said.
Diversity of all kinds at the police station is one of the ways that tension can be lessened, Hatzieleftheriadis said.
“Because of the world, Black people traditionally can be afraid of police officers,” Hatzieleftheriadis said. “To see a brown face come to your door and to understand the camaraderie there and to be able to be empathetic there — I think it’s really important to have that.”
To Hatzieleftheriadis, we’re all really alike.
“When you strive to be the best that you can be and you achieve things, other people see that,” Hatzieleftheriadis said.
This story is part of a partnership between Brookline.News and the Boston University Department of Journalism.