Grand Junction Citizen’s Academy – Week 1

The 2013 Spring Grand Junction Citizen's Academy has begun, and I have decided to take it this year and share with you a little of what I learn. The Citizen's Academy is free and open to anyone who is interested in finding out firsthand how our first responder systems work. I will be writing a short article about what we do week by week for the 16 classes.

The classes happen, for the most part, on Thursday nights in the new Grand Junction Police Department building at 5th and Ute. The will also be a Saturday class and one Tuesday night class. For the first week, we had an introduction to the class, met the fire chief and police chief and learned a LOT about the two departments.

Did you know that the City of Grand Junction puts our safety first? The police department is the largest department in the Grand Junction organization. They also, typically have the biggest budget. The police department is short staffed at this time and is looking to do more hiring this year. Because of the shortage of officers, many of their community outreach programs have had to be temporarily suspended. The Police Department also records crimes that happen and is where you file police reports for various incidents. Were you aware that you can file a basic police report online? The department consists of not only the uniformed officers that we see out there to "Protect and Serve" us, but also the Grand Junction Regional Communication Center. The GJRCC does a lot more than one would think. They are responsible for the 911 calls and dispatching of 21 different units in the Mesa county area. They took over 71,600 calls for the GJ police and fire departments alone last year. That is a bunch on 911 calls. You can stay in touch with what they are doing at the GJPD Facebook page.

The Grand Junction Fire Department is also a large department that is on duty 24/7/365. There are 5 fire stations scattered around the growing area of the city limits, but the fire department is responsible for an area that is much larger than just the city limits and include Glade Park. The most important and most used service the GJFD provides is advanced life support ambulance services. Well over 2/3 of all service calls provided by the fire department were for ambulance services. Thankfully 82% of those were non-emergency transport calls. Our fire department is also responsible for 3300 square miles of land, including land in parts of Utah, to provide hazardous materials spill containment. All of this is done with just over 100 firefighters and EMT personnel.The Fire Department is also where you go to get you burning permits, now that burning season is open. They have a GJFD Facebook page too.

I learned so many facts and figures in the first two hours of this free class, I am glad I was able to take a bunch of notes. I am really excited about what other interesting things I will learn as I get to ride along in a police car, visit a fire house and take a trip on a fire engine, listen to 911 calls being answered and so much more.  You can find out more about how to be a part of the Citizen's Academy by visiting the site at  http://www.gjcity.org/CitizensAcademy/

Be sure to check back each weekend to see what I am learning about, and consider getting yourself enrolled in an upcoming fall or spring session.