By Aaron Mahoney - Lethbridge News Now

Welcome orientation sees police cadets from five different agencies begin training program

Jan 28, 2019 | 2:43 PM

LETHBRIDGE, AB — A packed audience at the Lethbridge Police Station on Monday morning (Jan. 28) saw 34 cadets – from five different agencies – take the first step towards making their dream of a career in policing a reality.

This latest class of cadets in 2019 is the largest in recent LPS history and the first in the province where both police recruits and Community Peace Officer recruits will train side-by-side to earn their uniforms. 

Chief Rob Davis says they’re extremely proud to have members of the Blood Tribe Police Service and the Manitoba First Nations Police Service training alongside their members.

“I have been quite candid that real truth and reconciliation begins to happen when we share, grow and learn together, side by side. It’s real – a lasting memory and impact for everyone that goes beyond any awareness training or a power point.  This is an incredible opportunity for all of the agencies and their cadets.”

Davis says the diversity of the new class is important, as each of them brings something different to the table.

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“When I went over the biographies just as a snapshot, we have at least six countries that the cadets called home at some point in their lives, five languages are spoken that we know of, a number of cultural and religious backgrounds represented and that’s just what we know right now,” Davis continued. “As we get to know them over the next 22 weeks, I have no doubt we’ll learn more and more interesting things about each and every one of them.”

The class consists of 23 Lethbridge cadets, three from the Blood Tribe Police Service, one from the Taber Police Service, four from the Canadian Pacific Police Service and three from the Manitoba First Nations Police Service.

“I firmly believe that as the police we should reflect the population that we police here in Lethbridge. If you accept the Round Street Report saying 16 percent of the community is Indigenous and you have other demographics represented such as the Latino demographic, we’re moving in that direction and this is just the start of more to come,” Davis said.

The cadets, who bring a range of experience, will undergo 22 weeks of classroom modules and scenario-based training followed by several weeks with a Field Training Officer before they are ready to hit the street on their own. 

Provided the local recruits get through everything, Davis says it will work out to 10 regular officers and 13 Community Peace Officers.

There’s a real benefit to having the additional CPOs, as one of the obstacles they run into with recruiting is some of the threshold testing for some of the Indigenous applicants and English second language applicants, with Davis using a hockey metaphor to explain.

“Until we can address that testing, we can get officers in as CPOs. I always refer to it as the American Hockey League, a feeder league. We run a recruit class every other year, so if I have someone retire, I potentially have to run a vacancy for at least a year. This allows me to have the CPOs that are fully trained so that with a little bit of top-up training and some mentoring we can have them become a regular officer in a relatively short time.”

LPS will shortly be launching the Ambassador Watch program, something Davis hopes will bring people out to test drive a career and help that program, in essence, become like the Western Hockey League, another feeder for police.

“This is part of a career trajectory to help people get into law enforcement.”

The cadet training program is a partnership between LPS and the Lethbridge College School of Justice Studies, and through opening it up to other services allows people like Tha Sibanda to get involved.

He is one of the 34 cadets who began the next step in their policing journey, and is originally from Denver, Colorado but has been living in Manitoba for the last 15 years or so.

It was an article written by Chief Davis that initially caught his eye to look into this field because he had been working in corrections.

“He was talking about diversifying the service, and that really caught my attention. That he would go to that extent to put it out there and he actually laid out how he planned to do that. It’s that new notion that’s out there where we’re stronger together, in policing you’re always going to interact with different people from different cultures and different backgrounds and it’s good to have a mix in your service to better connect with those communities.”