Sunday, May 19, 2024
Following an appeal by Gatesville Police Chief Brad Hunt and a vote by the Gatesville City Council, the Gatesville Police Department will begin providing dispatching services for the Gatesville Independent School District police department.
After GISD decided in 2022 to form its own police force, the city of Gatesville, which previously provided school resource officers through its police department, opted not to provide dispatching services for the school district. Instead, those services were provided through the Coryell County Sheriff's Office.
"The former chief and former city manager recommended we not dispatch for GISD and to have the county do that," Hunt said. "I cannot see any monetary cost we would incur to provide that service, just time, and I believe we have the time to do this."
Hunt said there was an incident in which an unauthorized person was pulling on door handles trying to gain entrance to a GISD building during school hours, and the Gatesville Police Department did not learn of the incident until afterward.
"The school district police were able to take care of it, and the person was caught, but if we had known about it, we would have helped them," Hunt said.
"We are willing to dispatch for the school district and I have talked to Barrett Pollard (the GISD superintendent) and Chief (Gary) Stiles (the GISD police chief) and they were pretty excited. They would be in support of this."
Councilman Greg Casey thanked Hunt for working to strengthen relations between the city and the school district.
"I appreciate you trying to do better integrating cooperation with the school district," he said.
Pollard said he appreciates the support GISD has received from both the county and the city.
"Our local law enforcement agencies have really assisted our newly formed GISD Police Department," he said. "First, the Coryell County Sheriff's Office provided us with free 9-1-1 services last year. Now, the Gatesville Police Department is offering it as well. Chief Hunt, (City Manager) Scott Albert and the City Council are very gracious to do that and we will certainly accept their offer."
