When the Commercial recently reported that not a single Pine Bluff Police Department officer currently assigned to the public schools had completed training specific to those duties, the True Grit character Rooster Cogburn’s reproach rang loud and clear. Training? “We ain’t got none of that.”
This is just one more instance of intolerable cut corners emanating from the police department. In just the last year, we have reported on leadership quandaries, expensive electronic toys, botched evidence handling, mercurial disciplinary procedures, allegations of punitive transfers, unclear crime fighting initiatives; and now untrained school resource officers.
On top of all the indignities the taxpayers have funded, Pine Bluff Police Chief Brenda Davis-Jones has elected to remain consistent in her pattern of not responding when asked for comment. It is small wonder that she perpetually teeters on the precipice of a no confidence vote at the hands of the Pine Bluff City Council and has already suffered the ignominy of two failed no confidence votes by the council.
Even in the face of all the aforementioned chaos — including the incident at Jack Robey Junior High School, where students were injured from pepper spray that was sprayed by that school’s school resource officer — it is business as usual. What makes this worse is that the police department recognizes that training is available but just didn’t bother to send officers prior to deploying them in the public schools. And even though the Jack Robey pepper spray incident happened more than a month ago and the results of the investigation are complete, no decision has been made regarding any disciplinary action.
The National Association of School Resource Officers (www.nasro.org) hosts two levels of specialized training in a pair of week-long courses. This is in addition to the courses (offered by Arkansas Safe Schools Association in conjunction with the Criminal Justice Institute, a division of the University of Arkansas system) mentioned by the police department’s media representative, Lt. JoAnn Bates. Beyond the officers’ lack of specialized training, there is one other matter of concern in the recent Commercial report.
Independent reporting for Pine Bluff & Jefferson County since 1879.
The four officers assigned to SRO duty have between 13 and fifty months experience on the job. While those on the more experienced end of the continuum may have attained the appropriate level of “professional seasoning” to perform SRO duties, putting a 13 month rookie in that situation is a questionable move. As Paul Jones, the director of security for the Watson Chapel School District — himself a former Pine Bluff police officer and SRO at Watson Chapel — aptly stated, “They’re just putting them out here and they haven’t had time to even establish themselves as police officers.”
Jones is absolutely correct. While all certified officers must attend the state law enforcement academy, it is an article of faith in the profession that one learns the real workaday craft of policing at the side of more experienced officers. Cloistering junior officers away in the public schools does them (and us) a double disservice. On the one hand, deprived of an extensive career on the streets, they are hindered in the development of their craft. Secondly, by placing junior officers (bereft of specialized SRO training in the schools), the administration potentially provides the districts with a lower quality of police services.
Unfortunately, this arrogant detachment seems pervasive in the upper levels of the police department. They don’t like consistent criticism, while at the same time they are doggedly resistant to substantive questions. They cannot have it both ways. Either start explaining the rationale behind the cavalcade of clumsy choices or be prepared for pointed critique.