Menifee’s New Police Force Offers Rare, Extensive Training Opportunity

The city of Menifee is building a new police department from the ground up, and that presents a unique training opportunity. Everyone from community service officers to captains can go through training together.

Before officially beginning its service to the Menifee public in July, everyone on the force will go through extensive training. It’s an uncommon training opportunity that the newly appointed police chief, Pat Walsh, plans to take full advantage of.

The Importance of Training Together as One Unit

California’s newest cops will report to work two months before they officially begin their watch over the city for training.

“Training as one team is extremely rare,” Walsh said. “Typically, training is staggered across the force because you can’t afford to take officers off the streets, but we have the chance to complete training before we even put officers on the streets.”

The ability to train together not only gives everyone a chance to get to know one another, it also gives the force a chance to create a positive, cohesive culture within the force.

“One of the biggest goals of this extensive training period is to make sure we’re all reading the same sheet music, so to speak,” Walsh said. “This training will help us refine our skills and define consistent leadership methods to provide the best possible start for the city’s new force.”

The Training Offered

All of the officers joining the force already have core competencies like patrol tactics, use of force, and cultural competency. Lateral hires were purposefully made to ensure a swift and effective start for the new department. As a result, the two-month training can focus on specific learning opportunities. Training sessions will include:

• Teambuilding
• Leadership tactics and practices
• Stress management
• Defining the Menifee PD culture
• Evidence collection
• Fingerprinting and DNA collection
• Terrorism liaison training

In addition, the chief has asked several guest speakers to come in. For example, the district attorney will address the team to explain expectations and provide tips to make cases. A public defender will discuss how cases are lost, and Menifee’s mayor will speak about the city and its history.

The Background of the Menifee Police Department

Training is one of the last steps the Menifee Police Department will complete before officially providing service to the city.

It has taken a year and a half to get to this point. The city started researching the idea of creating its own force back in fall of 2018. The sheriff’s office provided law enforcement to the city at that time, and the city decided that its current growth warranted its own force.

Since then, the city has secured funding, hired a chief, renovated its old city hall building to house the new force, and actively recruited officers from all over the nation to join the team. When the hiring process is complete, the Menifee police department will have 58 sworn officers and 17 staff members.

The Menifee police department will start patrolling the city of roughly 100,000 residents on July 1, 2020.