34 graduate from Douglas County Senior Citizen’s Academy

The Douglas County Sheriff’s Office and Douglas County TRIAD presented this year’s Senior Citizen’s Academy from September 12 through September 16, resulting in the graduation of 34 students who attended the week long program.

The goal of the Senior Citizen’s Law Enforcement Academy is to provide crime fighting educational programs, fire safety and general information to senior citizens of Douglas County.

“I want residents to become more aware and comfortable with the services that we and the fire department provide to our community. We solicit feedback from the students to develop a better understanding of the needs of our senior citizens,” said Sheriff Ron Pierini.

The academy included training and instruction from sworn personnel from the Douglas County Sheriff’s Office on a variety of law enforcement topics including uniformed patrol procedures, jail/custody policies, criminal investigation, crime scene processing, youth services and volunteer opportunities available at the Sheriff’s Office.

“We love sharing what we do with our community in order to reduce the fire and life safety threats," said East Fork Fire Battalion Chief Larry Goss. "We are very appreciative of the outstanding relationship East Fork and DCSO have with one another.”

East Fork Fire and Paramedics District taught several interesting topics such as the services they provide, and the challenges they face daily. They educated the students on the response standards, structure and wildland responses, medical responses, and water and airport rescue. Trained personnel demonstrated different equipment needed for emergency incidents such as structure fire, wildland fire and personal protective equipment. They also demonstrated the 12 lead cardiac monitor. Several students made comments that the academy was “well organized” and said “these classes provided information I never knew.”

The Senior Citizen’s Academy is presented once a year in Douglas County in September.