Peoria Police Department Celebrates Explorer Program
Tom Keenan is an Illinois Central College student and is also one of three Explorer Sergeants. His ranking is designated by the stripes on his sleeve. (Tanya Koonce / Peoria Public Radio)
The Peoria Police Department is celebrating the one year anniversary of its Explorer Program. It’s designed to mentor young adults with the aim of helping them one day work in law enforcement.
The department re-deployed the program after a roughly twenty year hiatus. In fact, several Peoria Police Officers who graduated from the program pushed to reinstate it. Now 25 young adults are celebrating their accomplishments at the first annual awards dinner.
The Explorers are 14 to 21. The base requirements to participate include maintaining grades and remaining trouble free. But that’s just for starters.
Community Services Officer Daniel Duncan is the chief advisor to the Explorers. He says this group represents less than half of the young people originally signed-up, for one exact reason: “Commitment.”
Officer Duncan says it was important to separate out the participants who want only to learn police tactics.
“You have to come and volunteer your time for the beautification programs in Peoria, community gardens, special events that they have in the community. You have to be part of that to be in this program. So I think we weeded out almost everybody who couldn’t make that commitment at this time.”
But Duncan says that was to bring a certain mind set for the would-be cadets in training.
“For this whole year that this program has been going on, and this was before the Ferguson, before New York, the focus that every Explorer would say from the very beginning was to be a community oriented officer.”
Officer Duncan says it also hasn’t all been community service and theory. He says one of the Explorer training sessions was a paintball scenario.
“We had one of the guys was charging an explorer and how they would handle it. And I think it was 10 out of 10 times they actually fired upon the person because they said they were fearful of what may happen and they had their firearm out and there was several other things so. I said you always have to keep an open mind to these things as to what may happen as to you would do and what you wouldn’t do”
Duncan says the events in Ferguson and New York happened after that training exercise and then they spent time talking about the lessons learned about split second response situations officers can face.
Some also identify the program as a means to continue to grow a police force representative of community. Peoria Police Chief Jerry Mitchell calls it the department's bridge to developing protected class candidates from the city’s South End and the Near North Valley.
Jesus Romero is a senior at Manual Academy. His neighbor and friend told him about the program and at first he wasn’t so sure.
“It didn’t sounds as fun, but then you get into the program and you start learning about how things work through the police department and it got really really interesting and it took an interest in me so...”
Romero’s neighbor and friend is Christian Munoz. He’s a Sophomore at Illinois Central College, studying Criminal Justice. His professor suggested the program to him and he says it’s been worth it.
“We get a lot of hands on training with traffic stops and room clearing and we do a lot of community events which really help you in the long run. What’s been your favorite community event so far? Shop with a Cop, its really nice to go around with the kids and have them buy whatever they want with the money they get.”
Romero and Munoz are also both fluent in Spanish. Officer Daniel Duncan says that would be a great addition to the Peoria Police Department, because the Latin American population of the community is currently underrepresented.
But who exactly should participate in the program? Tom Keenan is a Freshman Psychology major at ICC and is also one of three Sergeants in the Explorer program.
“I think anybody with an interest in law enforcement should do this. If someone wanted a future in law enforcement, this program would be right for them.”
And what about a return on investment Keenan and the other Explorers who talked with us for this story might anticipate? Peoria Police Explorer Advisor Daniel Duncan:
“They’re really awesome. I really see them one day which will be in the near future, next four or five years, every last one of them will be on the department.”
Duncan says the program is a benefit to the participants, the Department and the community. But it operated this year without a budget. The police department provided the Explorers uniforms and badges. But everything else the officers have achieved with the Explorers has come from police officers and other community donations to the program.
The First Annual Peoria Police Explorer Awards dinner is Tuesday evening at the Gateway Building on the Peoria Riverfront. It was also made possible with some more significant individual contributions.