What does “law enforcement” look like on a practical, day-to-day level? How do officers do their jobs? Why does so much of the legislation coming out of Olympia not only hamstring law enforcement, but also puts community safety at risk?
EVOC course, Citizens Academy 2024. Tip: Do Not sit in the back seat of the patrol car during the EVOC fast course without Dramamine. (Don’t ask how I know that.)
You can get answers to all of the above and more with Citizen’s Academy.
Offered annually by the police departments of Aberdeen, Hoquiam, and Cosmopolis, West County Citizen’s Academy is designed to give Harbor residents a working knowledge of their police departments.
A 16-week course, the 2024 Academy met on Tuesday nights at the Hoquiam Police Station from January 16 to April 16. Saturday classes included EVOC (Emergency Vehicle Operators Course) training at the Weyco sorting yard in South Aberdeen, and hands-on firearms training at a private gun range in Raymond.
2024 Citizen’s Academy classroom.
Comprehensive
Citizen’s Academy instruction is comprehensive. Questions are encouraged. Instruction consists of lectures, scenarios, demonstrations, and tours. Instructors include officers from Aberdeen, Hoquiam, and Cosmopolis police departments and other personnel who address their individual areas of expertise. For example:
Both the classroom and hands-on Firearms Training were conducted by Cosi Police Chief Heath Layman. Layman is also an NRA-certified firearms instructor. He owns Willapa Firearms Training in Raymond.
For the class on Investigations, officers transformed the entire classroom into a mock investigation scene, complete with red and yellow “Do Not Cross” tape. (Do you know the difference between red and yellow police tape? You will after taking this course!)
Grays Harbor Coroner George Kelly conducted the class on what his office does and how.
The class on “Therapeutic Court” featured an overview of the program followed by presentations from four recent graduates. Each graduate shared how their lives were turned around, and in several cases, saved, by the program.
If you’ve ever wondered if high school Algebra has any real-world application, take the class on Collision Investigation.
Coursework also includes:
Patrol procedures and officer recruitment, hiring, and training.
Police ethics and citizen complaints.
Patrol operations and procedures and how police respond to calls, both routine and emergent.
Therapeutic Court and personal stories from program ‘graduates.’
Traffic enforcement.
Investigations – the who, what, when, where, why, and how.
Special Response Teams (Crisis Response Unit of CRU), hostage negotiations, fatal accident investigation teams.
Use of force and the “use of force continuum.”
K-9 demonstrations with both canine apprehension and narcotic detection dogs. (Amazing!)
Sgt. Verboomen (HPD) explains FARO scanner use.
Also:
Officer Involved Deadly Force Encounters and Line of Duty Deaths.
Grays Harbor Drug Task Force.
A tour of the E911 Dispatch Center.
An EVOC hands-on drive course.
Less Lethal Munitions and Tasers.
Collision Investigation + FARO Scanner use.
A tour of the Hoquiam jail.
Opportunities for “ride-alongs” with an officer.
Part of the “less lethal” class included crawling around inside an MRAP (Mine-Resistant, Ambush-Protected) vehicle. Incidentally, there’s a lot of misinformation about the MRAP. It has NO offensive capabilities. None. It’s for emergency response situations when law enforcement needs to approach and make contact with someone’s who’s armed.
MRAP!
Classes meet once a week for 14 weeks, January thru April. Each week-day class is about two hours. There are a couple Saturday classes with extended hours.
Typically held once a year, Citizen’s Academy requires an application. Applicants must:
Be at least 18 years old.
Live in Aberdeen, Hoquiam, or Cosmopolis.
Have no felony record, convictions or misdemeanor crimes or crimes of moral turpitude, or domestic violence.
After being selected, students in our Academy were provided with a three-ring binder, a notepad, an overview of Academy rules and expectations, a course outline and calendar (subject to change), and an I.D. badge.
Take-Aways
We recently completed our second Citizen’s Academy. Our key take-aways include:
State legislators who often know nothing about police work and do not understand basic police procedure make law enforcement’s job infinitely (and needlessly) more difficult by passing laws without the foggiest notion of how said laws will impact the ability of law enforcement to do its job.
Ditto consequences or potential repercussions for same and effects on public safety.
State legislators and ALL electeds would benefit greatly from this course.
We highly recommend Citizens Academy for any motivated citizen who wants to learn more about some of the “nuts and bolts” of law enforcement. By the time you graduate, you’ll have a basic understanding of police work and a better grasp of the subject than most people who are drafting legislation on same. You might even be able to educate a few.
Bonus Points
Informative, eye-opening, and eminently engaging, the Academy is also an excellent opportunity to expand your horizons and build camaraderie.
Besides. It’s fun! ------------------------ Kristine Lowder is editor of Conservelocity, formerly Lady Libertee, and is the oldest continuously publishing political blog in Grays Harbor. https://ladylibertee.wordpress.com/