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Another Misguided Town Goes the P.S.O. Route

WHITESTOWN, INDIANA, IS THE LATEST community to try out the Public Safety Officer (PSO) concept where police officers will be carrying firefighting gear in their cars and firefighters will be packing heat and chasing holdup suspects with their pumper.

The police chief, Dennis Anderson tells WISH-TV how simple it works:

"It’s just a matter of changing roles if they pull up in the middle of the night and there is a residence and there is smoke showing. They are going to be popping their police gear gun belts off, stepping into their fire gear and taking on that role," said Whitestown Police Chief Dennis Anderson.

Fire training for police officers takes about two weeks. Firefighters who get training in law enforcement must attend a 16-week police academy.

Firecop Britany Heylman  (WXIN-TV)

In a move that is no doubt designed to grab national headlines, the police department's first female officer will also be the town's first female firefighter after graduating from her 2-week firefighter school this week.

WISH-TV has it all in this video report:

 

Town merges police officer, firefighter duties

 

WXIN-TV filed this video report on August 31:

 

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Posted by on September 20, 2012 • Filed under: current events, Fire Rescue Topics, labor, News, training-fire-rescue-topics, Videos • Tagged: ,
  • John

    What a joke. PSO is nothing but a money grab by PD. It’s a town of less than 3000 people with full time police. The FD was manned full time by part timers, most of whom are career personnel in other cities. 550 runs a year including EMS. No reason they couldn’t have left it as it was, except they paid ICMA for a survey that said what every ICMA survey does.

  • BH

    ”
    Fire training for police officers takes about two weeks. Firefighters who get training in law enforcement must attend a 16-week police academy.”

    Remember those words- good chance they’ll be repeated in a NIOSH report some day. I hope to hell not, but you’re just asking for it with lack of sufficient preparation.

  • dbc

    Interesting how people condemn people who choose to spend their money they way they choose just cuz it might be different than how we want them to spend their money. remember the Blacksmith? Barber? etc? Small towns (resourceful people) find whys to make things work, they don’t worry so much about what you want. Don’t be afraid to ask “WHY” Gosh what’s next! Medics on bikes, M/C, FF w/AEDE’s, TV’s w/color in your car. REMEMBER HANDWASHING was laugh at in 1800′s too.