HPD Welcomes Lateral Officer
Additional Information
HPD is happy to introduce our newest officer! K9 Nitro will be handled by Officer Terry Riley. We were excited to have the opportunity to have Nitro serving the citizens of Hodgenville and Larue County!
Vape Awareness
The Hodgenville Police Department has teamed up with the Livin Well Larue Coalition and Larue County Schools to combat vaping among our youth. After receiving a grant from the LWLC, HPD decided to get our kids involved in helping bring awareness to the issue. We asked the schools to announce a contest for student to compete for a chance to be featured in our efforts. The middle and elementary schools submitted artwork and LCHS submitted written essays. The schools chose the top three submissions and HPD chose the two winners from each school. The artwork will be featured on a billboard we plan on placing on Lincoln Parkway. The two winners from each school will also be on the billboard. As soon as the billboard becomes available, we will be getting it up for the community to see and be reminded of the dangers of vaping! We would like to congratulate the winners featured below!
HPD also teamed up with the Lincoln Trail District Health Department to bring Vape return boxes to the schools! With funding from LWL, we were able to provide a box at LCHS as well as LCMS. These boxes are intended to give students an opportunity to turn in vape related products without repercussions. A learning component was rolled out as well to help student understand the dangers of vaping. A special thanks goes out to Melissa Phillips of LTDHD for her part in making this a success!
SRO Kevin Bennett has seen a large number of vapes during this school year and we wanted to get good information out to the community related to vaping and its dangers. We encourage anyone with questions to contact us!
Congratulations to our winners!
Aaliyah McCoy
Kal-leigh Brangers
Kal-leigh Brangers
Kal-leigh Brangers
Kal-leigh Brangers
Kal-leigh Brangers
Caroline Fulkerson
Kal-leigh Brangers
Caroline Fulkerson
Abegale Grimes
Kennedy Slayton
Caroline Fulkerson
Giselle Adams
Kennedy Slayton
Kennedy Slayton
Kennedy Slayton
Kennedy Slayton
Kennedy Slayton
HPD Welcomes Police Social Worker
HPD continues to explore ways to better serve the community with the resources we have while not overreaching fiscally. With the recent surge in calls related to issues that could potentially be better served long term by a social worker, we started to explore options on how to best address this issue.
HPD is excited to announce a pilot program that we hope will address the issue while not costing taxpayer money or requiring more manpower on the part of the department. We reached out to Larue County’s own Brionna Taylor to ask for help. Brionna is a graduate of Larue County High School and is currently a student at the University of Kentucky, studying to obtain her Bachelor of Arts in Social Work Degree. She is currently working with our local CPS office as part of her degree program.
After seeing Brionna’s passion for the job, we felt she would be perfect for what we envisioned for this new position. We reached out and she was excited to help. After contacting her advisor and working out the legal issues on our end, Brionna start as our new Police Social Worker (PSW) on Monday, November 29th. Although this position is temporary through just her next college semester, we hope to explore ways to continue the program if it sees the success we expect.
The vision for this position is for HPD to have someone other than an officer, to continue outreach to those individuals and families that we respond to in times of crisis. All too often we see officers merely put a band-aid on a problem in order to fix the issue in the moment, but what happens when the band-aid falls off and the issue remains? We hope Brionna is the answer to that question.
For example, if we respond to a juvenile that is suicidal, that issue is not going away after the police leave or take that child to an appropriate mental health provider. The PSW will follow up with that child and their family to offer the resources that can truly help in the long-term. The PSW will network with the local and state resources and community partners to ensure that we bring all of them to bear on the problems facing our citizens.
Since Brionna is doing this work as part of her degree program, she will not be paid by the city. This will help HPD better serve our community with no funding from taxpayers and allow Brionna to receive vital, real-world training as she continues her education and starts her career. We could not be more excited to start this new journey and look forward to sharing our progress in the future.
