Ross Philip Dallow was a senior member of the New Zealand Police who had an important influence on improved race relations in Auckland. He was also an Auckland local-body politician.
Dallow was a significant personality in the management of race relations in the Auckland Police District in the 1970s. As inspector, he was originally in charge of the task force that Graeme Dallow had set up as a temporary expedient to deal with street disorder among the large Māori and Pacific communities that had migrated to South Auckland. Later Ross Dallow headed the Community Relations Co-ordinators for five years. As leader of both units, Dallow worked on improving communications with Māori and Pasifika leaders. For example, he took Assistant Race Relations Conciliator Pita Sharples out with the Task Force one night to show him the problems on the street, and won the influential support of the Conciliator's office. In 1976 Dallow promoted the expansion of Police education programmes in secondary schools. Hitherto such programmes were aimed at acquainting pupils with the role of the Police in society and creating a sense that the Police were trustworthy and approachable. Dallow believed that the Police had to introduce more sophisticated programmes because pupils were acquiring knowledge of law-related issues from "radical and civil liberties types who enter the schools under the guise of 'liberal studies' ". After he became a superintendent, Dallow, in the face of the reluctance of many of his colleagues, spent much of his time addressing opinion-formers and cultivating a positive relationship with the media in relation to race relations and other police issues in Auckland. Dallow was District Commander in West Auckland and the length of his police career was 36 years. In 1979, Dallow was one of the police team who served at the mortuary at Auckland University School of Medicine, where bodies recovered in the aftermath of the crash of Air New Zealand Flight 901 on Mount Erebus, Ross Island, Antarctica, on 28 November 1979 were taken when they were returned to New Zealand. He was subsequently awarded the New Zealand Special Service Medal.
Local government
Dallow was a member of the Waitakere City Council. In 2010 he was elected as an independent councillor on the Henderson-Massey Local Board of Auckland city after an election campaign in which he was criticised for his use of police colours on his election placards and his comments on the "browning" of New Zealand at a West Auckland citizenship ceremony. Dallow did not stand again for the Auckland Council after his term expired in 2013. Dallow was a long-standing board member, of the Waitakere Licensing Trust, which owns and operates a chain of wholesale liquor outlets and public bars in West Auckland. He was chair of that board for eight years. He was re-elected as a member for a three-year term in the 2013 New Zealand local elections.
Athletics coaching and administration
Dallow was involved in athletics as a coach for over 30 years, enjoying considerable success. Athletes he trained set eight New Zealand records and won 31 national titles, and he was the manager of the Auckland team to the national track and field championships on many occasions. Serving on the committee of the Waitakere City Athletic Club, Dallow was instrumental in the fund-raising effort to build The Trusts Arena and Douglas Track and Field in Henderson, and his contributions were recognised with the West Auckland Legacy Award at the 2015 Sport Waitakere Excellence Awards.
