Allen Police: Behind the Badge
Behind the Badge explores the relationship between the Allen Police Department and the community. Join us as we get to know our officers by learning who they are, what they do, why they do it and how it relates to you.
Allen Police: Behind the Badge
From Gamer to Guardian: Officer Mike Delio
Prepare to immerse yourself in the inspiring journey of Officer Mike Delio, a dedicated member of the Allen Police Department's Community Relations Unit in Texas. Officer Delio takes us through his passion for community engagement by sharing his experience with impactful programs like the Rape Aggression Defense courses, Condition Six workout sessions, and Civilian Response to Active Shooter Events training. From offering hands-on experiences in the Citizen Police Academy to encouraging graduates to volunteer in programs such as Citizens on Patrol, his commitment to fostering community ties is evident.
Explore the challenges and successes of fitness initiatives within the Allen Police Department as we discuss the innovative FitForce program. Officer Delio shares the importance of maintaining a consistent workout routine and how the department motivates officers with incentives for passing fitness tests. With anecdotes from his 12-year tenure, we learn how these programs not only enhance physical fitness but also contribute to emotional and spiritual well-being, creating a supportive environment for law enforcement officers who are dedicated to their health.
Officer Delio's career journey is nothing short of remarkable, transitioning from professional gaming to a fulfilling career in public safety. He's navigated roles in multiple police and fire departments, highlighting the significance of community service and medical benefits. This episode also brings exciting updates from the Allen Police Department, including a revamped website and new online services. Whether you're interested in community engagement, fitness, or the intriguing path from gaming to law enforcement, this episode offers a wealth of insights and inspiration.
Welcome to this week's episode of Behind the Badge with the Allen Police Department. We're your hosts, Sam Rippamonti and Alexus Birmingham.
Outreach Coordinator Alexus Birmingham:And today we're in Allen, texas, with Officer Mike Delio with the Community Relations Unit.
Officer Michael Delio:Thanks for having me. Appreciate it.
Officer Sam Rippamonti:Thank you, so tell us a little bit about being in the Community Relations Unit.
Officer Michael Delio:Yeah, so I've been in the Community Relations Unit now for two and a half years, so it's close to my 12 year anniversary here now for Allen. So we do all the community outreach, all the public education. Some of our, our biggest programs are the rape aggression defense courses that are for women only, as typically every month all year round, a little bit of breaks that runs for four consecutive sessions on Tuesday nights. We have a condition six, which are free community group workout programs on Wednesdays and Fridays. That is at 6 am. You got to get up a bit early to work out.
Officer Michael Delio:We do the craze, which is a civilian response to active shooter events, active attack. We do security surveys for regular, you know, housing, residential apartment complexes. Most of it is for businesses, and we're the first police department in Texas that is a community education partner with the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children. So that replaces or rather updates some of like the stranger danger and a lot of the internet safety for all our young kids. So Citizens Police Academy as well, but that is twice per year. So right now I'm closing that up, right now I'm coordinating that and we do a plethora of all sorts of other things. Those are just the ones that we're kind of most well known for, and you can see that on our website, you know, to the community outreach section, you can get all that information plus way more than than what I just told you.
Officer Sam Rippamonti:Gotcha, so Citizen Police Academy, if somebody wanted to sign up for that. What kind of commitment is that?
Officer Michael Delio:So it's a lot Typically and sometimes it can fluctuate, but typically it's going to be about 11 sessions on Thursday nights, not all of them. There'll be some exceptions, like maybe a Tuesday or Wednesday, like one time, and then maybe a Saturday driving, but it'll be 11 of those. They're three hours because they run from 6 pm all the way till 9 o'clock at night. We try to get you out by 9 o'clock.
Officer Sam Rippamonti:Okay.
Officer Michael Delio:So there's definitely a huge time involvement in that regard, but we make it well worth your time entertaining, hopefully, I think, and that you'll learn a lot throughout your course about law enforcement and how you can better serve your community.
Officer Sam Rippamonti:I got you. So by entertaining, can you elaborate? Like what are you talking about? Are they getting to shoot guns?
Officer Michael Delio:They do so, they get to shoot a handgun or they get to shoot a pistol and they do get to shoot a rifle, plus they get some demos. So it's a free class for citizens, free.
Officer Sam Rippamonti:All our programs are free. We give them a gun to shoot.
Officer Michael Delio:We don't get to keep it, they don't get to keep it Well shoot a gun, Drive a police car.
Officer Michael Delio:That's right. They do get to drive. They do get to drive or pursue a driving course. What's some of the other stuff they do during that class? So canine is one of the highlights. So they'll go out to our canine training field, so our canine partners will come out. They'll get to see demonstrations for that and narcotic investigations. That's always really people find that interesting, like the dark web, cell phone extraction obviously just a regular general review of crime scene in general which leads into CSI, not like what you see on TV. But they'll come in and they'll show you some of the technologies that you might not be aware of to lift fingerprints and there's just a lot of material that we go off. Yeah, yeah, it's packed.
Officer Sam Rippamonti:I know, when I've talked about the dark web at different events that I've been at, people are shocked. They're like that's real. They think it's movies, but it's like the dark web exists.
Officer Michael Delio:Oh, yeah, absolutely.
Outreach Coordinator Alexus Birmingham:Aren't they able to volunteer also after completing the program or what all goes into that?
Officer Michael Delio:So that is pretty much like the only way to segue into volunteers in policing or citizens on patrol. And what that means is if, after you've done the Citizens Police Academy and you've expressed the interest that you want to do more where you would like to drive around I'm sure you've seen, hopefully you've seen those vehicles that are marked, they look like police cars but they'll say citizen on patrol and you can volunteer your time further to just be another set of eyes on the street. But let's say you're like ah, I still want to help, that's. I don't really want to put myself out there like that. You can the VIP, the volunteers and policing like maybe work in the front desk, maybe we can find something clerical inside the police department, because there's always. They don't tell you that when you sign up for this job there's a lot of paperwork involved. Okay, so we can always use the help in other areas.
Officer Sam Rippamonti:That's awesome. Shift gears a little bit. You talked about a 6 am workout. I know that's early, but if I'm not mistaken, that's your workout program. You created it right, yep so.
Officer Michael Delio:I've been training that way for probably like 15 plus years, so I knew that I wanted to do something with the community. So that's what came natural to me. One cause it's cost-effective. Cause there's it's a free program but we didn't spend any money on equipment or like that. It's all calisthenics, it's all body weight, where I show things that are more difficult, things that are easier, so it's really accessible for for the public, as long as you're willing to get up.
Officer Michael Delio:I tell people, the hardest part is the hardest part is getting there. The rest is easy. I'll get you the rest of the way. You just you got to show up. You just you got to make it. So those are on our event bright, which we switch over to that and hopefully we'll get a chance to talk about that a little bit later during this episode. But that's how you would register, just like you would for RAD and all the other classes that we have. That's how you would do it. Gotcha, let's go year round. I take very little breaks. I take a very small break for Thanksgiving and a very small break for Christmas time, but pretty much it's every Wednesday and Friday and I just do it nonstop. So I say a healthy community is going to be a happy community, so that's our rule.
Officer Sam Rippamonti:You just started another fitness initiative here in Allen. I think it was brought by Chief Dye.
Officer Michael Delio:So I didn't start it but I was brought in early to the meetings so I've had a lot of input for one looking at what our new hire testing would be. But right now I think what you're talking about is for our current officers, our incumbents, and that is a fitness test that does have a compensation. So the goal is to incentivize and promote just a healthier, you know workforce. Right that can. That's huge benefits because it can reduce injuries, work or comp claims, get you faster back in action if you were to get injured, and it just helps to other aspects of our job. As you can imagine, right With all the things that we got to do, that's physical. So I had assistance, obviously from other people in the apartment and we just finished proctoring all the tests for the whole department. So that was a lot of work but we got through it and got everyone through it, but it was a lot of fun doing it.
Outreach Coordinator Alexus Birmingham:Well, aside from, I guess, the fitness part of it isn't there also it stands for FitForce or what all goes into that.
Officer Michael Delio:So one of the things that Chief Dye brought over was the FitForce, which everybody, when they hear that, they automatically just think of the physical component, but there's so much more than that. There's the financial, there's the spiritual and the emotional side of it. So it's a more holistic approach to that right to make sure that some areas that law enforcement tends to kind of neglect right Like, for instance, like emotional support, especially like when you see different things about your career that we weren't always the best at doing. Right, that's making sure that we improve those things. So like, for instance, you know we had it before, but he's big on making sure that we keep building our peer support team, which we have. So we have a lot of great things here at the Allen Police Department that we're very fortunate for.
Officer Sam Rippamonti:You said something about there's compensation or there's goals or incentives if you hit certain reps.
Officer Michael Delio:Yes, every extra rep you got once you hit a certain threshold, you're in the game and you got your six hours. And then after that, every repetition after that, which, for those, you're like well, what's the test? Well, it's, you run 75 yards, and hopefully I don't get in trouble for saying this 're like well, what's the test? Well, it's, you run 75 yards and hopefully I don't get in trouble for saying this.
Officer Michael Delio:You run 75 yards, you do your three push-ups like chest to ground make sure it's fair, right. You run back 75 yards, you do two burpees, you run back 75 yards, you do your three push-ups and it just keeps going for 15 minutes. So every rep that you can do, which like the completion of every calisthenic portion, like the completion of the pushups after that run, that's a rep. The completion of the burpees after that run, it's a rep. So as many reps as you get, each rep is an extra hour. So he wanted to make sure that even the people that were getting after it and they were training that they still had something to aspire to try to kind of push it further. And that's why it's kind of left in that fashion where every rep counts.
Officer Sam Rippamonti:Yeah, so if you're thinking about transferring from your police department or wanting to be a police officer, you get time off with pay here in Allen. That's right. As long as you're fit, you perform on the fitness test. So that's pretty awesome incentive.
Officer Michael Delio:And you get fitness bars
Officer Michael Delio:I always said you'd be surprised what people do for a t-shirt. Well, we got t-shirts, all right, we're going to have quarter zips or hoodies. We're going to have the fitness bar, like I was saying, which that'd be hard to get because that'd be, you know, your top 10%. So, and then a challenge coin. That's even higher, that's even more difficult, so we'll have a special challenge coin. So we got a lot of cool stuff coming for the officers.
Outreach Coordinator Alexus Birmingham:Oh, yeah, so. So you said you were with Allen for almost 12 years. Do you have any great stories that you can share with us?
Officer Michael Delio:I got a lot of funny stories, but a lot of officers do, but they're not always appropriate where we can share which is out there. But one thing I think I can that I always tell this story is and this was in frill training, so for people that are listening, you typically for Allen, texas at least, we're by ourselves in a squad car. That's how we can get more presence everywhere. So it was infiltrating. That's why I had someone sitting in my passenger seat. So a pursuit came out and it wasn't too late, but it was around 6 or 7 PM, so the traffic was still somewhat dense and so a pursuit had initiated, going northbound on the US 75. So I was quickly became the second unit and we're weaving in and out.
Officer Michael Delio:At some point they got it and you said, well, why are we chasing them? The story for that is there was loss prevention, was following an organized retail theft ring from all the way, multiple different cities down south, like dallas and like arlington, like all over, right, and they and they came to allen, right, because we have the allen premium outlet mall. So it's that's pretty dense, right, it's a rich opportunity if that's what you're looking for. So they came up, they were followed and then officers coordinated with loss prevention, located the, the thieves with the vehicle and that's how that kicked off, right, yeah, so sorry about that. We're picking back up. We're now we're chasing them on the I-75 and I start to lose, lose ground a little bit.
Officer Michael Delio:So the first officer is kind of getting ahead because the traffic is dense, they take an exit and the timing is off where it's like oh, I don't know if I'm gonna be gonna make that exit in time, and so I'm used to running code. It's not a deal. I used to run code all the time when I was working in Dallas, right as a, as a firefighter, run code to everything. But my field training officer, he grabbed the top. You know handle and you know he's just yelling like cause.
Officer Michael Delio:He's like we're going to die, cause I'm just I'm driving fast and he's like you missed the exit and I'm calling. Told him I was like I got this. It's fine, like I got this, I'm not really worried about it. He's a little, a little stressed and I know that he looks like I missed the exit, but I already know that I'm gonna take like the grass median, probably going about 80 miles, so mile, you know, or so. Like I know that I'm, I'm gonna take an unconventional route to get off this highway. Uh, so I don't know what it looks like now, because that was like 12 plus years. That was like not 12. I'm sorry, that was like 10 or 11 years ago.
Officer Sam Rippamonti:It's been a while Crown Vic days.
Officer Michael Delio:So no, so I must've been in a Tahoe.
Officer Michael Delio:Yeah, I must've been in a Tahoe. So I get it right. It's a little bumpy. He's like boom, boom, boom, boom. We saw the suspect car take this huge dip and it got some air as we were going into a hotel parking lot and then the other squad car in front of us took some air and, yeah, we took some air. So my head smacked into the roof of the squad car. That's right.
Officer Sam Rippamonti:The first two cars weren't.
Officer Michael Delio:Oh yeah, it was just ridiculous looking. Slow y'all down. Nah, we were in it and that ended well, right. Yeah, nobody got hurt, Everything worked out fine. That's awesome.
Outreach Coordinator Alexus Birmingham:Did you start your career with Allen or are you originally from Allen, texas? Did you start your career with Allen or?
Officer Michael Delio:No, so I don't think I have much of an accent, but sometimes it just depends on who I talk to. I'm actually from Queens, from Ozen Park, new York. That's where my family's from. That's where I met my wife, which I've been with my wife since 1998. So it's been a pretty long time. I got four kids. So I mean I lived in Allen now for over well, about 15 plus years, cause that's how it started. So I was just going to join, cause I have family, that's NYPD and FDNY. I was just going to join NYPD, got to the point cause it's a long story.
Officer Michael Delio:But I had started in with Austin PD very briefly, like in 06. And then I my oldest has a very rare, severe genetic disorder, so we didn't have any family down in Texas. So we went back, uh, kind of got re-acclimated and then I was trying to get back to Texas. Wasn't working out. But then Dallas was just randomly. I didn't think I was gonna get hired by Dallas Fire and I was ready, like in the final stages, for like NYPD to to go on there and I was flying back and forth for Dallas while I was being a warehouse manager. I was ready, like in the final stages, for like NYPD to go on there. And I was flying back and forth for Dallas while I was being a warehouse manager I was managing like an entire city block in Brooklyn, like in a really bad place. That's like right next to Pink Projects Because the leasing office used to be Pink and my employees would get robbed at gunpoint like getting off the bus. So it was a rough neighborhood. I'd have like employees like I'd see line supervisors. I was imagining they'd be like running, getting chased by employees. Anyways, I digress so I'm flying and then they give me a conditional offer, right. So I'm like, oh okay, so we moved to Texas, right.
Officer Michael Delio:So I did my research for Allen. I saw that it was one of the safest cities in the country, would rank top 10, sometimes rank one based on population. So I mean they're doing awesome, believe it or not, because everything is super expensive. But when I looked at the schools comparatively to Allen, it was the best deal that I could see as far as trying to live somewhere that would have access to good schools, at least back when I initially came down here. So when did that started?
Officer Michael Delio:And I took it for granted, thinking that it would be good medical benefits, because I was like, okay, I need medical benefits for my daughter and I'm used to. I'm like, okay, you get in public safety to serve, but it's traditionally, you know that you're going to have good benefits to take care of your family. No-transcript social security disability. If I stayed and I did a shift to overtime she would lose it. So I knew like this wasn't going to work, like I had to find something else. Well, now I'm in Texas, I'm back again, right, so everything is here.
Officer Michael Delio:So, living in Allen, right, I looked at Allen Fire and Allen Police because I wasn't adverse to doing police. I just wanted to have an opportunity to serve my community, right, and be part of the community, because I've been in Allen this whole time as well, so it's fantastic place. So I was for both and I just happened to get hired by the Allen Police Department. So it has worked out pretty good for me. Where I've been really fortunate in my career here, where you know I've got to do a lot of different things pretty quickly, like so, if you look at field training and patrol and all that, that was about four years. And then I went upstairs to go be a training coordinator, which I know a lot of people will say oh, that's boring. That's like the Texas commission on law enforcement that has to do with like our badge right and making sure that we're doing all the trainings or everything that we need right to have in order to do this job. So making sure that we're in compliance. Helping out with accreditation in reference to training, getting to train a lot myself so I'm a combatives instructor did that for a long time here at Tactical Emergency Medical Services, like all the tourniquets, human static agents, all that stuff. Done that for a long time. Plus, I've taught a bunch of stuff and I was fortunate that the Plano Richardson Police Academy has started.
Officer Michael Delio:While I was as a training coordinator and now in police department was asked five agencies so it's Plano and Richardson and then McKinney Allen and Frisco were asked to help participate. So they sent me down there to help like on the backend, getting everything started with like the back end, getting everything started with like the testing procedures being in compliance with TECOL. And then they just they liked me so much that they were like, hey, we want this guy to be here. And I was staying there full time, like working day, like seven days straight like keeping the department with everything I needed to do and then actually coordinating recruits. Like I had BPOC three. I had that one. It was, was still, I think I hold the record the biggest class down there playing police academy.
Officer Michael Delio:Got them all 100 graduated and I was just training a lot, a lot, a lot so and then from there I went on. After about five years total, I went on the community right, community relations, which now it's. It's been about over two and a half years for sure. So I've been really fortunate with all the different things that I've been able to do, like SWAT. I got off SWAT this year. I've done that cumulatively for a little over five years as their tactical medic. So I've had my hand in a lot of different things.
Officer Sam Rippamonti:You wore a lot of hats. I got to ask you something though. Yeah, so I heard this rumor. So you've been a fireman, you know, police officer for a long time. I heard a rumor that you were a professional video gamer back in the day.
Officer Sam Rippamonti:Yes, so Is that true?
Officer Michael Delio:So remember I told you Austin in 06? So the history with all that is. So I'm 41 now, so when I was probably about 16, that's when I picked up quote, professional gaming, which they say like. Well, to do that that has to be the majority of your income, which, for a while, like it was the majority of my income was from competing at international tournaments which, oddly enough, were here in Dallas, texas, the most. They were not always in Dallas, but every time I was coming down here they were like at the Hilton Anatole in downtown Dallas, if I'm saying that correctly. And then it's been at other places in this Metroplex over the years and I did that into like my early 20s, even like throughout college Even. I think I even competed in a tournament when I was working for Dallas Fire, even when I was a firefighter paramedic. I think that was the last tournament I ever went to, was that? And then I just I didn't make a ton of money.
Officer Michael Delio:It's probably like less than $10,000 over the course of it.
Officer Sam Rippamonti:I don't feel like that's a career you grow old in.
Officer Michael Delio:Well, yeah, you age out of it. Your reflexes go like yeah, these young kids it's just wild.
Officer Sam Rippamonti:I've tried to play with my kids and it's like I've tried to play with my kids and it's like I last about five minutes and I'm done.
Officer Michael Delio:That's the only reason why I knew anything about this area. The only reason I put in for Austin, like for one of the work at Austin, is I transferred with FedEx and I wanted to go to Phoenix, arizona because they were hiring a ton of police officers, and I got denied the transfer and I got accepted an Austin transfer. So I transferred FedEx and that's how then I you got on with Austin. Yeah, I got on with Austin PD. That's how it was all connected and the only reason I knew I didn't know that worked out?
Officer Michael Delio:Yeah, I only knew about it because I went to Lanning. Which people listening? Probably what is Lanning when you have to put your computers together, right, instead of going online tournament would be at with zero ping and it was in plano like the land centers were in plano.
Officer Michael Delio:That's the only reason I knew about this area at all.
Outreach Coordinator Alexus Birmingham:What games did you play?
Officer Michael Delio:So I started off with unreal tournament and like quake. Those were the big ones, like old school first person shooters. And then when they ported, like halo so people, the young people, might still remember halo when they ported out with a pc then enemy territory, like ake Wars it was mostly just first-person shooter games, all with a mouse and keyboard, by the way, because I know they keep doing these tournaments at the event center and I'm like, yeah, well, that's like with controllers, it's not the same.
Officer Sam Rippamonti:It's a lot different. Yeah, Speaking of that deal, at the event center I worked that competition oh my goodness, Like people wear jerseys, oh yeah, For their team and it it was a sellout every day and people were in there going crazy cheering for their team when they would show up. I was like this is insane.
Officer Michael Delio:And that's small. Like this market here is small in comparison to Europe and elsewhere. L ike Asian markets.
Officer Sam Rippamonti:Switching back to the Allen Police Department. So is there anything new going on?
Officer Michael Delio:So, uh, we were talking about Eventbrite, but to segue into that, the website not just the Allen Police Department website, but all the city pages have just gotten a complete refresh, hopefully more user friendly, right, so you can get to quick access to the things that you need very fast. Hopefully a better experience on your phone as well. So Allen Police Department, of course, is part of that refresh, where you can also then go to the community outreach section and all the different things you can see. And before I talk to Eventbrite, because I don't want to forget, the community crime mapping tool is on there. You can quickly access that so you can look at crime trends or just look at the general crime.
Officer Michael Delio:We're very transparent. We'll show you all that data that's happening in Allen. We'll show you all that we also have for Class C. So for those that are like what is a Class C misdemeanor, let's say, something that's equivalent to a speeding ticket or a Class C theft, something that's that Class C misdemeanor you can go online and file it. You can file your own charge, you can still call us, right, we can still come out and still address it, but you're not going to be able to do that for and it's meant also for if you need to do anything with crashes or like a hit and run, but like, if there's anything above that, you still need to call us so we can come out and we can file the report, we can investigate and all that. So all that information is there, the Eventbrite.
Officer Michael Delio:We'll be adding that also to our social media pages, which is also important, that you follow us on Facebook and Instagram. We still have X, but Facebook and Instagram are our biggest ones that we use. Facebook is going to be the biggest as far as like information for us, so you'll be able to. We'll be adding that with Eventbrite. His link is on there, but you'll also find that on the city page as well. Eventbrite. The reason why that's important is because if you follow it, it will automatically notify you when the next RAC class is, the next condition 6 class is or any sort of event that I haven't talked about, because sometimes we do one-offs, like just events that are maybe once a year, something like that Citizen Police Academy that I mentioned twice a year. It'll be on Eventbrite, just like how the fire department they do that as well Shout out to the fire department. So if you didn't know this. Now you do. You can check out the fire department's Eventbrite that way as well, okay.
Outreach Coordinator Alexus Birmingham:Yeah, if there's one thing you could tell the community, what would it be?
Officer Michael Delio:So we're getting pretty close now to holiday shopping right, shopping season, all right, and money so, and gifts everywhere. So I remember when I was growing up. You know it was a couple of different ways parents can hide their presents. You know you either hide the presents all in the closet and hope the kids don't find it. I don't think mine did it, but I've heard stories of people keeping them like in their trunks. That's not a great idea to be stowing your stuff in your trunks, but like a more practical sense, we'll see where people will go and they're hitting a bunch of different stores and maybe they have a hatchback and they're in between shopping. They're putting presents inside places inside the vehicle that you can see and then they're going to make other purchases. We want to avoid that as much as possible. We also want to try to not be doing things like late at night, making sure we're doing it in well lit areas, make sure that people aren't following us back to our cars, that we don't have very suspicious cars that are now parked right next to our car that were not parked there before we went to the store right. Especially if there's like a bunch of parking everywhere, why is this random van parked next to my car, right, and always having your keys ready when you go into your car, not fiddling looking for your keys, making sure that you're locking your car as soon as you get into your car. That can be a lot of problems right there If you just lock your car immediately when you get inside your car.
Officer Michael Delio:And what do people like to do during the holidays? They like to get with family. You like to go out and go on vacation? Right, go, go out of town. Well, let's put that on Facebook when you get back in your home. We don't want to advertise that to everybody, that, hey, no one's at our house. You can come by and check it out while we're gone. So we don't want to advertise that. One thing that you can do that's hey, that's what we're here for. We don't mind. If you want to call up the Allen Police Department and put a special watch where an officer will go by and they'll periodically check to see if something's been damaged in their house, if there's been a break-in, and they just go look and make sure everything is okay, we're more than happy to do that. Don't hesitate to call if you're going to be away for an extended period of time and I think that's the majority of the ones.
Officer Michael Delio:Hopefully I didn't miss any, hopefully you can help me out if I missed some of the ones.
Officer Sam Rippamonti:Sounds like just overall awareness. Correct?
Officer Michael Delio:Yes, keep your eyes out of your phone when we're walking through the parking lot. Thank you, eyes out of your phone. That's not the time to do it. Do it afterwards.
Outreach Coordinator Alexus Birmingham:We're going to take a moment to answer some questions from our viewers. One of our questions is about our new boxing gym.
Outreach Coordinator Alexus Birmingham:Would you like to share a little bit about our new boxing gym?
Officer Michael Delio:Sure, so Allen IC has been great, where they helped us out with Roundtree Elementary, which was to me. It's still called Roundtree Elementary. It's pretty close to my house but it's a youth boxing gym. It's free for the people that have access to it and it's going to be for age 10 to 18. It's not just for Allen residents, it's for North Texas and it's just going to be a great opportunity for law enforcement to be involved with the Utes in a non-enforcement capacity. And I know y'all have been very heavily involved with the setup, so I'm going to pass it back to y'all to kind of fill in the gaps and let them know what our motto is.
Outreach Coordinator Alexus Birmingham:So our motto is Mentoring Future Leaders and we just want a presence with our officers and our youth and a good mentorship between them and involvement in their health and different resources that we provide.
Officer Sam Rippamonti:So one thing about it we'll open up early 2025. There will always be an officer on site when the gym's open and it's all volunteer-based. Most of us officers, like I don't know anything about boxing, but you know, if they need me to come in and sweep the floors, I'll sweep the floors if that's what they need me to do to help out. But this is all going to be volunteer-driven, where we have actual boxing coaches that are going to come in and they're going to teach our youth and teach some of our officers how to box and, like Alexa said, it's mentoring our future leaders. This is a place for them to go to be part of a group, be part of a team, so to speak, where they can learn discipline, learn the skills of boxing, and there's just a lot that goes into the sport, that goes deeper than just the athletic side of it. So it's going to be a great program that we're really, really excited about.
Outreach Coordinator Alexus Birmingham:Yeah, and our gym's not just limited to our Allen residents, it's for all North Texas kids that would love to join our gym. They're all welcome.
Officer Sam Rippamonti:Well, Mike, we really appreciate you coming on today and talking to us.
Officer Michael Delio:Absolutely.
Officer Sam Rippamonti:Is there anything else you'd like to add before we leave today?
Officer Michael Delio:No, just make sure you keep checking out our social media. There's always just a lot of information that's on there. We like to put everything that's happening right, even if it's just a lot of information that's on there. We like to put everything that's happening right, even if it's traffic related and you just don't know unless you follow right.
Officer Sam Rippamonti:So make sure you're following on all our pages. If you're interested in any of these programs, there's more information on our city website at AllenPolice. org.
Outreach Coordinator Alexus Birmingham:Thank you everyone for tuning in and make sure to like and subscribe and if you have any questions, leave them down in the comments below.
Officer Sam Rippamonti:See you next time.