Five of the eight new officers joining the Galesburg Police Department are either minorities or women, reflecting the city’s efforts to add diversity to the force. The newest GPD officer — an African American man from Galesburg — took the oath of office Monday in a ceremony at Galesburg City Hall.
Eight new officers have been sworn in since Dec. 19, pushing the GPD force to 49 — two short of its set staff size. Of the new hires, two are women, two are African American men and one is an Hispanic man.
Galesburg Police Chief Russ Idle tells WGIL, “We’ve never brought in this many new officers at one time. In fact, it’s about twice as many as we’ve brought in at one time. From training to equipment to having enough trainers, it’s certainly a logistical hurdle to have so many new officers at once.
“We’ve had an issue with hiring police officers for years. We’ve started offering some hiring incentives and we’ve used advertising, but there’s also been just hard work by a lot of people to get us to where we’re at today.”
Idle said the staff shortage in the GPD never jeopardized public safety.
“I’ve always said, if someone calls 911, we’re going to be there for them,” Idle said. “But obviously when you have a shortage of manpower, it puts a strain on people.
“To get back to more comfortable manpower levels will take some of the pressure off of my officers, and maybe allow us to provide some extra service that maybe we aren’t able to do today.”
Idle said the city sought to hire the best police officers, but improving diversity on the force was a goal.
“Obviously, it’s important to get the best people, and we did that,” Idle said. “But it’s also very important that your workforce — in policing, especially — looks like the community they are serving.
“When they don’t, it has a negative impact on trust and relationships within the community. If it doesn’t look equitable, people are distrustful. It’s a good thing for us and the community when we can have young people come on that represent the community.”
Recruiting African American officers has long been an issue for the GPD, according to Idle. The GPD has a veteran African American female officer on the force, but have not had a Black male officer in over 10 years.
“We’ve had some difficulty hiring African American officers, and we obviously have a segment of our community that wants to be represented on the police force,” Idle said. “So it’s a good day when we can start to work on alleviating that.
“Our department will look like the community — just a whole mix of people, which is great.”
The two new African American male officers are both Galesburg High School graduates. Phillip Parks took the oath Monday, while Kobe Ramirez was sworn in on Dec. 27.
Idle said it’s beneficial to hire officers who grew up in the same community where they will be working.
“It’s huge to have officers from Galesburg,” Idle said. “When you can hire people who grew up here and who are committed to this community, it makes a difference. I’m an import, so I’m not going to hold it against someone who comes here and makes the community home. But your odds of retaining someone are higher when this was their home.”
In addition to Parks and Ramirez, Galesburg’s newest police officers include: Jonathon Meyer, Jessica Pawlak, Noah Harlan, Jorge Perez, Dorian Utsinger and Kendra Rogers.
