ST. GEORGE, Utah — Those old enough might remember a Police Academy movie called “Citizens on Patrol.”
Well, it turns out that in St. George, there really are citizens on patrol, and they're having a lot of fun.
“I love it. I actually enjoy it more than when I actually got paid for a living because I've got a sense of accomplishment,” said Michael Froggatt, who is not only a volunteer but helps coordinate the unpaid team. “I'm not paid a dime and it's fantastic.”
Froggatt is the coordinator for the St. George Police Volunteers in Public Safety — or VIPs — who serve as unpaid sidekicks for the police.
“We've got volunteers from all walks of life and all countries,” he said in an Australian accent. “ Obviously, I'm not from the United States.”
Froggat had a long career in a different kind of law enforcement: information security for Disney. But he says he and many of his VIP colleagues had a dream of going on patrol.
“We're all different, you know, different walks of life, different careers. We have been ex-law enforcement, and some have been everywhere from in the media industry, to psychologists," he said.
Did he say, psychologist?
“So I'm a therapist here in St. George,” said Christine Hurst, who is one of 26 volunteers on the VIPs force. She says her counseling skills have come in handy.
“I wanted to give back somehow in a different way. I think that's been a big part of my service here is to be able to show empathy,” Hurst said. ”And yeah, that's really hard. You know, just kind of helping them feel heard.”
As the VIPs move through the parking lot, Hurst can be heard yelling, “Come on family.” It’s a close-knit group. Among the volunteers are five married couples, including Froggat and his wife.
He says last year, VIPs worked 6,000 hours. They are assigned to work at least four hours a week with many maintaining their day jobs.
“We do everything from trails patrol, animal control, we help them at the shelter. We also serve summons and subpoenas. We do handicap parking violations,” he said. “We do traffic control. And there's a list of things. We also help with the police vehicles to keep them maintained.”
Yes, that includes picking up the puppy poop at the pound, which Terry Taylor doesn’t mind doing.
“I think our goal is to let the police officers have more free time to do the important big police stuff so they don't have to do this,” Taylor said. “So we do it for them and it's just an opportunity to serve the community. It's really fun though.”
The VIPs go through much of the same training that regular police officers do as well as an extensive background check and polygraph test. All for no pay.
“You definitely have to want it,” Froggat said,
But the police officer dreams only go so far. There are no weapons or badges.
“We just do nonviolent serving, just people need to go into the court and pay a parking ticket, something easy like that. We don't do anything dangerous,” Hurst said. “And we have a lot of fun.”
