POUGHKEEPSIE – Eleven members of law enforcement completed 40 hours of School Resource Officer (SRO) training on Friday at the Dutchess County Law Enforcement Center. Dutchess County Sheriff Kirk Imperati, a former SRO, calls the training “vital” to keeping students and staff safe in the learning environment.
The training, Imperati said, “Is very essential because we need to continue to train people – when we enter into a contract agreement with local school districts, we guarantee that all our school resource officers have had this 40-hour class and they are properly trained.”
Under the instruction of six SRO instructors, led by Dutchess County Deputy Sheriff Alonzo Montanya and retired Town of Poughkeepsie Police Officer Chris Hamel, the trainees learn techniques involving investigating and interacting with juveniles as well as all of the resources available for them to use.
In addition to interacting with the students, SROs develop relationships with the staff and make presentations to both groups on school safety, sexual assault prevention, and DWI issues during prom season. “Discretion is their ultimate tool,” Imperati stressed, noting that SROs try to avoid putting a juvenile in the legal system. “We’re there to help people – we don’t want to arrest anyone unless we absolutely positively have to,” the sheriff stressed.
Four deputies from the Dutchess County Sheriff’s Office participated in the training along with four Village of Walden police officers. The City of Kingston police sent one officer, joined by one from the Greene County Sheriff’s Office and one officer from Hyde Park.
