Community Coffee event highlights HPD

Community Coffee at Hudson Library with Highlands Mayor Patrick Taylor started back up again after taking a hiatus because of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Last Friday, Taylor and Highlands Police Chief Andrea Holland had the first installment of Community Coffee, talking about law enforcement in the town.

“We are so glad to be back again,” Hudson librarian Carlyn Morenus said. “We have really missed having the mayor here and the citizens here each month. Hopefully we won’t back off again.”

Taylor started off the meeting talking about a letter he received blasting him and the town for the way they handled COVID-19 in Highlands.

“They were upset that we tried to put limits on people coming and so forth,” Taylor said. “Other people were upset at the mayor that we weren’t clamping down hard enough. The writer said they had sold their home and have now moved to another retirement community. Then somebody sent me an email calling me a ‘75-year-old mayor buffoon.’ Now, here’s the thing. I’ll accept buffoon, but I’m taking issue with the 75. I am not 75, I am 73, until August. So, this person didn’t get their facts right. I also want to say, this is a conversation with the community. This is not official policy and in fact, I might be saying things today just communicating with the people of the town and my ideas might even change as we go forward. I am not representing official policy. The town board votes on policy. I’m just here having a discussion with folks.”

Holland said though Highlands is a blessed community, the town is not immune from the world around us.

“A vehicle gets stolen, but it doesn’t happen much,” Holland said. “There’s alcohol up here and it’s 2 a.m., and someone doesn’t remember where they parked their vehicle, but they do legitimately get stolen too. We also have an elderly community up here and might not remember where they parked their car. I say that, because if you look at the police report and see a stolen car, 99 percent of the time, that is what that is. We usually find it. We did have an actual car stolen a couple of weeks ago. Someone left their keys in the car, ‘But we’re in Highlands,’ well, everyone else coming up here is from somewhere else. What better way to commit a crime than come up here on the Plateau and then take it where it is really hard for us to locate these individuals. We are blessed to have outside sources that we have a good relationship with. The point of this is, don’t leave your pocketbooks, wallets, keys and belongings in a vehicle.”

Lack of staff

Across the nation, police departments are having a hard time finding the staffing to fill empty spots and officers are leaving departments on the regular searching for better pay and safer work.

Lt. Leah McCall said departments across the nation are 12 to 25 percent short staffed.

“People are leaving to go to jobs that are not as dangerous, for more money,” McCall said.

In Highlands, the story is the same. Last month, the department lost a K-9 officer and one other officer.

“That is one entire shift,” Holland said. “They both worked the same shift. It’s ok, we are going to make it happen. We still know how to work the road and Capt. Jolly is stepping up for us. We are going to be short staffed, but don’t worry. We are going to make sure that everyone has the same patrol you have had before. With that being said, we can’t guarantee the same services that you had prior to COVID-19. You’re not going to see us on Main Street doing foot patrol as much. Store owners, you’re going to have to police your own business. We are trying our best to protect and serve you, but serving you well means having those officers ready and able in a mobile unit that is going to take them quickly to your aid. I am going to try and be on foot patrol more often to try and take that burden away from some of the road patrol. We are going to try and do our best to be out there.”

Holland agreed with McCall saying that officers just don’t want to do the job anymore.

“You see the news. We are getting killed out there,” Holland said. “One bad cop, or ten bad cops are making the rest of us look bad. I can attest to you that we have a good group of men and women up here and we are going to do the very best not to violate your constitutional rights and if I see that that is happening, then I am going to address that. If I see that someone is right on the line of a toxic employee, I’m going to address it so that we don’t become world news.”

Before the shortage of employees, Holland said they were able to get the best applicants, but that is not the case now.

“We used to be able to hire people with some really, really good backgrounds,” Holland said. “But now, I’m seeing agencies hiring some people and I’m thinking, ‘You really hired this person?’ A while back, if you had a drug charge or a DWI or even if your license was revoked for any reason, you weren’t getting a job.”

At Southwestern Community College, McCall said they are having trouble getting students enrolled in their police program and might have to postpone the class, which trickles down to less applicants for the departments in the area.

“When they run a school, they have to have a minimum of 10 students at a time, in order for a class ‘to make,’ or it’s not monetarily worth it for them to run that class,” McCall said. “They have gotten special permission in the past to run eight students at a time, which is not a good class for the students either because there are role play exercises and things like that. So, they said if they didn’t have enough people apply then it is going to be postponed. So, not only are we not getting people interested in law enforcement, but those who are, are not qualified. We don’t want to lower our standards and have somebody up here that may not last anyways.”

Holland said it takes a special person to patrol Highlands.

“There was a bear in my yard. I’m going to go out there at 4’2” and take care of your 400-pound bear,” Holland said. “Up here, I say that I want to put on some slippers over my shoes before I step into some of these houses, but in other areas, I want to put on a Tyvek suit on for myself before I walk in there.”

Speeding in town

Residents will start to see speed detection devices go up around town. Holland said the machines are there to alert drivers of their speeds.

“Again, we are short staffed,” Holland said. “You’ll start to see some of these machines light up as you drive by. We are looking at getting a few more after July 1. We like them. Some people are not going to like them. They are here to let you know when you’re driving and you’ve got 15 things that you’re thinking about, then you see this flash and it breaks you out of those thoughts. They really work to alert you and wake you up to see how fast you’re going. They are not out there for us to track you and see how fast you’re going. It’s just an alert. We have gotten a lot of complaints about speeding in neighborhoods. We have one that will stay with the patrol officers that they can deploy throughout the week. We are not going to take things and move them every day. So, if you have a complaint about speeding, just let us know and we will find a pole and put it up.”

Crime is down in Highlands

Across the board, the crime statistics in Highlands are down, according to Holland.

For larceny and theft, in 2019 there were 46 cases, but for 2022, so far, there are only eight cases.

“We are here,” Holland said. “It may not look like we are doing something, but this shows we are.”

Burglary is down from 25 from 2019 down to four in 2022. Holland said shoplifting and fraud cases are also down in 2022.

“Crime is down overall,” Holland said.

Code enforcement

McCall said she is proud of the Town of Highlands for having the forethought years ago to put rules into effect.

“In other words, little things like advertising signs,” McCall said. “When you leave the city limits, do you see how many advertising signs you see everywhere? On the side of the road, and there’s no limit to the size and shape or anything like that. That is one of the things that I’m looking for whenever I’m out and about, signs that are out that people don’t have permission for, and I pull them up.”

She said all of the officers are working to enforce different ordinances.

“There are several ordinances that we are all trying to enforce,” McCall said. “Like the noise ordinance, the nuisance ordinance, whether it’s a barking dog or a rooster.”

Holland’s response to question about Uvalde, Texas shooting

During the question-and-answer portion of the meeting, Highlands local Lila Howland asked Holland about the recent shooting at an Uvalde, Texas elementary school, leaving 21 dead.

“I know that we think we are so special and so secluded,” Holland said. “But so were they.”

Holland said since she has worked in a place where there is no violent crime, it is not a matter of will it happen, but when.

“In the past two weeks, we have reached out to other counties about coming out of my budget to hire a legitimate training group to come do a live simulation training with us,” Holland said. “That way we are hearing the noise and we are running it through the school. I don’t want to be the chief that is answering all of these questions. It could be where on that date there are only two officers up here. It is 30 minutes, at the very least, for a deputy, if they are not up here, to get up here. If they are up here, then we would have three. It would take a SWAT team maybe 45 minutes, maybe longer. I can’t answer for them, but some of them are on duty, so they might have five ready to go, but it’s Franklin.”

She said the department does train, but not as often as they should.

“I’ll be the first to say that we don’t train as often as we should, but we are going to work on that,” Holland said. “We do have a school resource officer that is going to be over there, and he is more tactically mindset than the previous one we had out there. So, he is going to be a good fit.”

One improvement that Holland hopes to make to the SRO arsenal is a carbine rifle kit.

“The carbine rifle kit would attach to the SROs handgun,” Holland said. “Right now, we have rifles in the school, however, they are in one of the big gun safes. What good is that? So, what I’m looking at, and I don’t know if we would even be allowed to do this, and I know out east, all of the SROs are required to wear a backpack and it’s got a, for a lack of better terms, it’s a breakdown carbine looking rifle thing that attaches to your handgun. You’re still going to have the same ammo that’s in the handgun, but if a kid gets a hand on the kit, it is just a piece of metal. It’s not going to give you the power of an AR, but it can have a longer range than a handgun. You’re going to be shaking, you’re being shot at, your kids are being shot at, so this will be able to get the gun to your body and give you more control and more range. This is just something we are looking at.”

Taylor said it is terrible to even have the conversation.

“It’s terrible we are having this conversation, but I believe it is necessary,” Taylor said. “I remember when I was first elected mayor, and people told me that I had too many police officers up here. This is a different world we are living in now. Any bad thing can happen in any school, at any time. We have to be prepared for this.”

- By Christopher Lugo