ASSOCIATE Magazine FBINAA Q4-2024

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have a healthy department. The pain officers deal with is real. There must be action plans in place. Officers must be able to reach out for additional help with no backlash. An effective chief or sheriff should offer and implement some sort of program or action plan to ensure all officers within their departments are offered a positive and productive mental health door to open. Please don't wait till it's too late, take a positive approach now. Failure to provide such a mental health program will result in officers' poor decision-making, putting themselves and others in danger, health problems, excessive absenteeism, unstable family dynamics, and many other problems. The time for chiefs and sheriffs to act is now not after it results in the death of an officer.

and deadly circumstances demands that our employees are not distracted by the mishandling of their human resource needs. An officer worrying about whether they will get their time off for a protected activity may not be as focused on the technical re quirements their job requires from an officer-safety perspective. An officer experiencing unaddressed discriminatory or harass ing conduct may be distracted and unfocused on the types of dangers typically encountered during their shift. Having your HR house in order allows resources and energy to be more focused on risk management and officer safety. CONCLUSION There are numerous resources and partners available to assist public safety leaders in their human resource endeavors. These include but are not limited to: The International Associa tion of Chiefs of Police (IACP) Human Resources Section, City/ County/State Human Resource Departments and business partners, human resource certification organizations, and hu man resource and risk management consultants with municipal insurance pools. The time is now to build partnership with your human resource professionals and make human resources a part of your critical knowledge toolkit.

About the Author: Dr. Gary Metts is a graduate of the FBI National Academy Session 202 and currently holds the positions of Assistant Dean of Humanities and Social Sciences and Director of the Criminal Justice Graduate Program at Charleston Southern University, SC. With 30 years of law enforcement experience, he retired as a Lt. Colonel from the Sumter County Sheriff’s Office, SC, where he managed daily operations. Prior to his time with the Sheriff’s Office, he served 8 years in the U.S. Air Force as a narcotics/bomb K-9 Police Officer, spending 4 years supporting the U.S. Secret Service on advance security teams for Presidents Reagan and Bush. Dr. Metts

earned a Doctor of Business Administration with a specialization in Criminal Justice from Northcentral University (2012), a Master’s in Public Administration from Troy University (1996), and both a Bachelor’s degree and Master’s certificate in Criminal Justice from St. Leo University (1992, 2004).

About the Author: Jeff Williams has worked with Citycounty Insurance Services (CIS) since April 2022 and serves as a Public Safety Human Resource Consultant. Before joining CIS, Jeff worked for the Forest Grove (Oregon) Police Department (1994-2011) and Beaverton (Oregon) Police Department (2011-2022), retiring as Deputy Chief of Police. Jeff holds the following HR certifications: aPHR (HRCI) and SHRM-CP (SHRM). He is graduate of the FBI National Academy Session 270 of the FBI National Academy, a graduate of the Oregon Executive Development Institute, and earned a master’s degree in public safety from the University of Virginia and a master’s degree in administration of justice and security from the University of Phoenix.

Continued from "Historian's Spotlight", on page 22

DEPUTY CHIEF GEORGE C. LABONTE

Appointed to Wrentham P.D., 2003 Promoted to Sergeant, 2010 Promoted to Lieutenant, 2012 Promoted to Deputy Police Chief, 2018 FBI National Academy Session 282, 2022

Thanks to Scott Bekemeier , NA Session 282, for sharing this moving tribute with NA Chaplain Harding. It is an inspiring story of true grit! All of us know the monster named Cancer – some personally, some professionally – but all of us know the terrible impact it has on lives. I wanted to share this story for two reasons. First, George graduated from the 282nd Session with this tremen dous burden on his shoulders. I remain in awe at this significant and historic accomplishment! And two – I want each one of you to redouble your efforts to take care of yourselves. That means regular checkups with your doc, periodic testing (necessary for both women AND men) and minding what you consume. No one is going to take care of your health for you... it is up to you! Please keep George’s family – and the Wrentham Police De partment – in your thoughts and prayers. Stay safe and healthy, my brothers and sisters.

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John Simmons, FBINAA Historian

32 FBINAA.ORG | Q4 2024