FROM MILLBROOK POLICE CHIEF P.K. JOHNSON
On Saturday, October 9, 2021, the Millbrook Police Department will host its 11th annual Cops and Kids Day at Village Green Park beginning at 9 a.m. until 2 p.m. at the Village Green Park on Main Street.
This event is geared toward children from 3 to 16 years of age, but all are welcome. T-shirts will be provided for the first 950 children to register at the event. There will be plenty of fun, food, and games during the event, at no charge, while our young people get an opportunity to interact with our local police officers, firefighters and other public safety officials.
There will also be static displays and K-9 demonstrations during the event as well. This is an excellent opportunity for you and your children to meet your public servants in a relaxed and fun environment.
I’ve been in law enforcement for well nearly 33 years and I can’t tell you how many times that I’ve been at a restaurant, grocery store, high school football game, and numerous places about town when a well-meaning parent or grandparent says to a child; “See that police officer over there, he’s going to take you away if you don’t behave!”
Reactions vary, but usually the younger kids will become shy and try to hide from us. Now imagine, if you will, you take that same child that you’ve teased about having the police take them away, and you take that child to Auburn or Tuscaloosa for a football game. The child becomes separated from you in a crowd of over 100,000 people. Do you really want that child to be afraid of a police officer right now?
As Chief of Police, I want our department to have the best relationship we can with the citizens that we serve, in each neighborhood and community that makes up our City. What better segment of our citizens to begin than our young people. Due to reality shows, hard news, and social media outlets, there is a huge amount of negativity attached to what law enforcement does. People, especially children need to understand that we are people just like their parents. We are real people with different jobs, but we do so much more than issue traffic citations and take people to jail. That’s just a small part of what we do.
It’s an opportunity for our citizens to get to know us as human beings, to see past the gun and badge, and realize that we are real people just like them. It’s a great day full of fun, games, activities and free food for the kids. I encourage all our local parents to bring their children out to Village Green on October 9th, to spend the day with us, get to know us, and have some fun. It’ll be a great day. Even though there is a lot of work involved in putting this event on, I have employees that look forward to this day all year long. I think some of them have just as much fun as the kids do, which is Great! At the end of the day that is what it’s all about.
