How often do you get to peer behind the badge into the heart of a police chief? On a poignant edition of Skip Happens, I, Skip Clark, am accompanied by Chief Michael Scheryer, whose unexpected detour from sports training aspirations to a life in law enforcement paints a vivid portrait of public service dedication. Michael's transformation from a young police explorer to the leader of the Camillus Police Department unravels in our heartfelt chat, where candid tales of triumphs and trials reveal the emotional fabric woven into the uniform of those who protect and serve.
Brace yourself for raw insights into the volatile world of policing as Chief Schreyer recounts the perils of responding to domestic disturbances and the hazards of seemingly routine traffic stops. Our conversation doesn't shy away from the psychological impact these confrontations have on officers, nor does it gloss over the camaraderie that fortifies them against the weight of their duties. I also take a moment to honor the unsung heroes of the force, from 9-1-1 call takers to the supporting cast of spouses and family, who collectively uphold the thin blue line.
We wrap up this special session with a frank discussion on the current state of affairs in law enforcement, confronting the uphill battle of recruitment and the importance of community bonds. Chief Schreyer's reflections serve as a reminder of the human element within the badge, and the transformative power an officer wields, capable of altering lives for the better. Even as we navigate the complexities of police work, this episode is a tribute to the commitment and courage that defines the brave men and women in blue.
Thanks for listening! Follow us at youtube.com/c/skiphappens
How often do you get to peer behind the badge into the heart of a police chief? On a poignant edition of Skip Happens, I, Skip Clark, am accompanied by Chief Michael Scheryer, whose unexpected detour from sports training aspirations to a life in law enforcement paints a vivid portrait of public service dedication. Michael's transformation from a young police explorer to the leader of the Camillus Police Department unravels in our heartfelt chat, where candid tales of triumphs and trials reveal the emotional fabric woven into the uniform of those who protect and serve.
Brace yourself for raw insights into the volatile world of policing as Chief Schreyer recounts the perils of responding to domestic disturbances and the hazards of seemingly routine traffic stops. Our conversation doesn't shy away from the psychological impact these confrontations have on officers, nor does it gloss over the camaraderie that fortifies them against the weight of their duties. I also take a moment to honor the unsung heroes of the force, from 9-1-1 call takers to the supporting cast of spouses and family, who collectively uphold the thin blue line.
We wrap up this special session with a frank discussion on the current state of affairs in law enforcement, confronting the uphill battle of recruitment and the importance of community bonds. Chief Schreyer's reflections serve as a reminder of the human element within the badge, and the transformative power an officer wields, capable of altering lives for the better. Even as we navigate the complexities of police work, this episode is a tribute to the commitment and courage that defines the brave men and women in blue.
Thanks for listening! Follow us at youtube.com/c/skiphappens
Hello everybody and welcome to another edition of Skip Happens and, of course, skip Clark, your host of Skip Happens tonight. You know, normally I come on here and we've got a country artist hanging out waiting to tell his story, his journey, all the ups and downs and all that. But you know what? I've kind of broken away from that a little bit, especially for tonight, so it's going to be a little bit different. The gentleman sitting to my left yeah, he's been doing this for a little bit. I'm trying to think of how to explain who you are. You know what? Here's the deal, here's the deal. That's what I'm going to do. All right, you just pulled me over. In other words, he's a cop.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I said cop, we have the two way mirrors here and everything. But all right, how would you introduce yourself? Go on, get up to the mic. All right, you just pulled me over, so this way you can introduce yourself to everybody. You just pulled me over, you walked up to my car, I put the window down. Well, I went like that Actually it's a button now.
Speaker 2:It's a button now.
Speaker 1:I know, so how would you introduce yourself?
Speaker 2:Chief Shryer with the Camel's Police Department.
Speaker 1:There you go. That's who's with us here tonight, and what did I do wrong?
Speaker 2:Oh, it kind of all depends right.
Speaker 1:Yeah, exactly so I thought it'd be rather interesting to have Chief Shryer here with us and tell us a little bit about his journey becoming a police officer in law enforcement. To be perfectly, your mom just chimed in already.
Speaker 2:Oh of course.
Speaker 1:But to be perfectly honest with you, you and I have known each other. I've known you since you were born yeah, exactly, and so very proud, and you've been. You know I go on with the podcast and Michael, you're always like that's so cool. I see you and Zach and I love you. Know I'm a big fan of the wolf and a big fan of country music. And I said, dude, you know you got to come over, we got to talk about you, because when you got sworn in as police chief, I was crying like a baby, and that's the God on his truth. I know you were and I said I was a Red Sox fan.
Speaker 2:Someone had to remind me that the other day.
Speaker 1:Yeah, why did you say that? I don't know, I thought you were a Yankees fan. Oh, I am.
Speaker 2:But I, yeah, I don't know, Just come out.
Speaker 1:Well, I don't understand, but it must have been the moment and you just kind of whatever at that moment.
Speaker 1:But you know, thanks for coming by. I know it's been a while and, of course, being a big baseball fan and all that, but most importantly, what you do for your community being a police officer. And let's take us back to the very beginning. Now you're chief, you made it to the top, but let's go back to those days when Michael Shrier went to the police department and said this is cool, yeah, so tell us about that. How long ago.
Speaker 2:Well, I mean, I think it starts as a kid at the firehouse, growing up in the firehouse.
Speaker 1:That's true.
Speaker 2:And you know being exposed to the fire department and the police department. I was around it all the time. And growing up, I always, I always, I was heavily involved in sports. And you know, when I got to high school, the, the plan that I wanted to pursue, or the career I wanted to pursue, was actually a sports trainer, working with, with a sports team. You know whether it was up at SU or in professional sports, and then it really I didn't really have the, the thought process or the desire to be a cop.
Speaker 2:Until my I think it was my junior year in high school, joe Claybaugh was from from the police department. He was the Explorer advisor for the for the Explorer program that my brother, matt, was started in before me and Joe was one of my baseball coaches, and on bus trips to and from games I'd hear these stories about him and the job and how it was never the same thing every day. It wasn't a Monday through Friday behind the, you know, behind the desk type job. It was. You're out in the community, you know, trying to find the bad guy and helping people and you know, and some of the stories that he shared piqued my interest and and I joined the Explorer program when I was 16 years old and the rest was history. I did a couple of ride alongs and I was going to say the ride along, man.
Speaker 2:So yeah, yeah, that's, that's what started it for me and you know I finished up high school, went to OCC, took criminal justice. You know I was on the five year plan up there, yeah.
Speaker 1:Life comes in. That gets in the way once in a while.
Speaker 2:Work and having fun took precedence and but I, but I continued that path pursuant the career, and you know, and then, in 2004, the very first pre-employment Academy up at up at OCC, with the Central New York Police Academy, came into play. And I asked our captain then, who was our chief for many years, I said, hey, is this program worth, you know, worth, you know enrolling in, or not? And he said Absolutely, this is the, this is the, you know, the future of you know, police Academy.
Speaker 2:So I had been. I had gotten a job at Great Northern Mall doing security, working with the Sheriff's Department, state Police, clay PD, and I paid my own way. You know, it was college tuition. It was probably, probably 10, 12 grand with every when it was all said and done. So I enrolled in that Academy and I was. I was working full time and going to the Academy full time, so I'd probably get two hours of sleep a night.
Speaker 1:You know you're young, you could do that. It was easy. Yeah, it was.
Speaker 2:But it was. I was determined Because at the time they're back then, you know, which is not the same scenario now. But we had 800, you know, 700, 800 people on the civil service exam and you know, at the time there wasn't much hiring going on for for a couple of years and this was what got me in. And I had been knocking on the door at Clay PD once or twice a month and told by by the commissioner hey, go away, come back next month. And I'd be back next month and I did that for, you know, probably a year. One day I went in and said hey, you know, I finished the first phase of the Academy, I want to work here, and you know. And he said, ok, I'll give you, give you a shot. And the rest is history.
Speaker 1:That was with Clay.
Speaker 2:So yeah, I started at Clay in March of 2005.
Speaker 1:And then you get you transferred to Camillas Yep, and that was back in 2000.
Speaker 2:2007.
Speaker 1:Yeah Well, only a couple of years in clay.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:So, yeah, went back home. Yeah, you know, being from Camillas, and that was yeah, that was the.
Speaker 2:You know Camillas was always the place that I wanted to work at but they they didn't have any full time openings at the time and Clay, clay did and I had some. I've got, I got to, knew a lot of, know a lot of the Clay officers that the town of Clay it piqued my interest because of how busy and you know how big that town was and they gave me, they gave me the opportunity so I took it and you know, growing up in Camillas, you know I always wanted to get back there. I was happy at Clay for a while and because of the, you know I experienced calls and you know crimes in in Clay. You know in one year that most people don't ever see in a career.
Speaker 2:And I got to experience a lot. I was exposed to a lot.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:But, but the opportunity came to come back to Camillas and I took it, and here you are, and here I am.
Speaker 1:Well, you've made it to chief, yeah, so that's pretty cool. You're living your dream, your passion to do exactly what you're doing, and we're very grateful for you doing what you're doing. How does it feel, though? You're back in your home area, and I'm sure you go on calls every day, or you have your men go out, and men and women go out and calls every day, but do you see people that, like crap, I went to school with that guy, or you know or, as somebody gets pulled over and yeah, well, you know what's it feel like. I mean, do you just do your job, but don't worry about it?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean, you know, the first thing is is being human right. Right, you know, and you know being, you know having, you know having compassion, empathy, you know being respectful. You know it's unique too because you know my grandparents my dad's mom grew up in Warners, yeah, so you know my dad, my mom grew up in Camillus and me and my brothers grew up in Camillus. So you know, I remember, shortly after I transferred back to Camillus, I was working midnight and me and my partner went on a call with someone that grew up with my dad and I think he had been a member of the fire department at one point. And you know, very quickly that person put two and two together and you know, and it was a tense, you know, domestic type call, but I think with that recognition, you know, kind of helped you know I guess, help ease the kind of Attention.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, so that person was able to kind of come down a notch and and then we were able to resolve the issue without a you know anything too crazy.
Speaker 1:Would you say the when you respond to a domestic, they've got to be the worst because you don't know what you're getting into.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah is that?
Speaker 1:yeah, because you don't know if somebody's got a gun, somebody's got a knife, somebody you know, obviously they're not in the right frame of mind at that time and they've got some sort of dispute going on with their significant Other or something like that. They that has to be difficult and it's more than just one car, don't they usually send a whole bunch on those because of that?
Speaker 2:Yeah, it depends on the scenario. Yeah, you know, traffic, traffic stops and domestics are probably the two most unpredictable, two most dangerous Elements of our, of our job. Because it is unknown, you don't know, you know, and so safety is always paramount. You know, trying to maintain, you know, maintain your composure, being professional, you know, and there's always, there's always an explanation, you know, I've always. I think what's helped me is I try to put myself in people's shoes to understand why they did what they did. Or you know what, what avenue they're they're going down, and you know, sometimes you can understand it, you know, and I you take that into consideration with how, how you're gonna handle the situation. Sometimes, you know, you think you might know why someone did something, why they did what they did, but but then, yeah, surprises you could be something completely different.
Speaker 1:Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's a unique part of it, you know, it's the unknown, you know and Helping people. You know the the crazy thing about. You mentioned domestics. We hired a young, young officer who's going through. We put her through the Phase two of the police academy and hired her full-time and she's going through Field training. But she's a young, younger officer. You know was the same age as me when I started you know.
Speaker 2:We had a conversation Before she started her field training and I said you know, just think about this. You know, you're 22 years old, having to, you know, give marriage advice. You know, and handling domestics of people that are your parents age. There they're having them. You know marriage problems, you know so. So you, you know you get life experience rather quickly in the job and you know, and At the end of the day, it's, you know, it's, it's, it's as easy or as hard as you make it.
Speaker 1:You know yeah, you're in a tough position though. I mean, you're in the big chair, you're in that office and you have how many men and women order you so we've got there's.
Speaker 2:We had last year we had 25 positions, full-time positions From me down to through patrol or police officers, and this year the the town board allocated for additional positions, so we'll be at 29, and then we have we've got six Special patrol officers that are SROs in schools, and then we got a couple of part-timers that work in our courts and we have one part-time officer, who, who runs our code program, which is version of dare.
Speaker 1:Oh, okay, I was gonna ask about that because back in the day we had a drug awareness, resistance education, education, thank you, and I remember I was. I used to go to those that they used to have what they call dances back up.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, Of course you know I was the DJ there and I did a lot for the Salve PD and they gave me a dare code.
Speaker 1:I can't even get it around me now, but I Remember that was called dare but it's called what now, code. It's clearly oriented.
Speaker 2:Okay, that was our, our spin on it, probably going back 20 years now, at least.
Speaker 1:Oh, okay, thanks for making me feel, or our?
Speaker 2:department Reinvented, you know, kind of tweak some things with it. Yeah, we've actually just been discussing that. Now is, you know, I think you know, with with today's, you know the technology aspect in Social media side of things that you know that's where a lot of our problems are coming in now with with kids. So it's it's we're looking at revamping that program again to like it, to modernize it.
Speaker 1:Do you feel that, you know, with the legalization of marijuana and now we've got all that going on, I mean, is it a whole new scenario now? I mean, you've got parents that are, and you got the kids you got there's so much going on. It's got to be a lot different than it was 20 years ago. Oh, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah it's, you know it's bizarre. I had a teacher friend tell me the other day how you know it's. It's quite common for Parents that are dropping their kids off to high school they're smoking weed in the car with the kid on their way to school. Oh Jesus, you know. And so you know.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's legalized, but you can't smoke it while you're in the car.
Speaker 2:No, no, no but they do like you said they do now.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you're in a position of authority, but I think just last night coming home, we went up to the basketball game and I Don't think they're at the game, but we're in a light and it's like I'm getting high sitting here because the car next to me was. You know, it's like it's crazy.
Speaker 2:It's everywhere now.
Speaker 1:You smell skunk. You know what you do in your home is one thing, but that aren't you putting others at risk? Oh yeah, I mean, it's the same thing is drinking. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and that's the. I think that's that's the challenge. You know I mean there's there's there's dad out there about. You know the so association with with crashes and you know DWI, you know Impaired driving rest and but yeah yeah, it's surprising. I remember leaving the gas pumps one day when I was a cop I I had to go get gas. I was working a case and I was holding myself open. I had to go back to the police department to I think I had Processed a crime scene and now get gas.
Speaker 2:I'm pulling out on a Milton Ave and here goes this pizza delivery guy literally driving with his knee Lighting lighting a bong, you know, and as he's driving, so you know, I pulled, pulled him over and, you know, dealt, dealt with that situation.
Speaker 1:But so how do you deal with the situation, as is that?
Speaker 2:Yeah, you know you do your. If he is impaired or intoxicated, you run him through tests. You know now we have a plethora of drug recognition experts that we can call to assist us with that. But you know at the time it was illegal. So you know you Confiscate that as evidence, you know, and yeah, I'm a warning Lee, whether it's traffic tickets or Penal law, you know you unlawful possession of marijuana, that that was what we did back then and that is that I mean.
Speaker 1:I Don't know anything about this, but if you get caught doing something like that and you get a ticket or you Go and get processed, I guess it would be you get out right away, though right, yeah, yeah. Yeah, it's. I mean is that I know that's.
Speaker 1:I don't want to talk politics here, but that's one thing I will not do on the skip happens podcast, because skip will happen and that's not good but you know I mean you hear and you read and just watch the news every day Somebody has done something really really that they really bad, that they should be incarcerated for, and next thing you know they're out walking the street again until they have till they go to trial, yeah, and then how many times do they turn around and do it again?
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's, it's frustrating. I mean we've had. We've had people laugh at us, give me my ticket and I'll go to the next place. You know, I mean it's frustrating, you know. But but it is what it is. You know, I mean, we still have a job to do, mm-hmm. You know, we're not judge, jury and right executioner right.
Speaker 2:It's you know. So you know we enforce the laws and you know we document, we forward the evidence and all of our reports to to the courts and the district attorney's office and the defense attorneys and then it gets figured out there.
Speaker 2:But yeah if you, if you dwell on that, you know, worry about every outcome it's. You know it can, it can be, you know it can be discouraging and frustrating, but but, but you just got a, you got a. Got a easier said than done, right, you know it's. Yeah, you know I see it all the time. You see, you hear these scenarios where someone gets released or you know the case gets expunged or, you know, dismissed. You know it can be. I'd be like what that's heartening.
Speaker 1:But but you can't let that you can't let that. You get a lot of repeat offenders with certain things. Oh, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, there's there. You know, I mean there's there. There are those people that that you can, you know you don't need to ask them questions about there you know who they are their date of birth home address.
Speaker 1:Come here, jack, you know you can, or Darlene, or whatever you have.
Speaker 2:You know you could complete a complete a report without having to ask him any of that.
Speaker 1:Just just make a copy of this one, change the top of it. But yeah, so you know you're just crazy when you think about it. It's really cool. Yeah but you're doing one of the most dangerous jobs there is, the dangerous, most dangerous. And I know in the gut, you know we were talking in the beginning, but I'm actually his godfather and that's that's. You know it. Our kids play together.
Speaker 2:Well yeah, well, no, my kids play with you.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and your little walkers around the house. I think he's so into specs but it's a very dangerous job and Going up through I forgot what I was gonna say now. But oh so, have you have little ones at home? Yep, I've been through it, got grandkids now. But you know, you see these, I remember, let me, I'm gonna, I'm gonna tell you what happened to me once, and maybe your dad told you about this Because I was a pet.
Speaker 1:I am a past chief at the Fairmount party apartment and I Remember right after I got out as chief, we had a call of a house. Fire was down in the Lower Fairmount area and we got there and the parents had gone to the turning stone and the kids were home alone. Kids died. We get everything we could. They get them out. They brought, I was, I drove the truck, I was pumping it, I was the pump operator and they put the. I remember I'll get all God, I'll never forget this. They, they put the child down next to me to work on the child. But I had to, still had to do my thing and I remember going home that morning and I bawled my eyes out I really did, it's just like because I just wanted to hug my kids and all that. That was only one-time experience for me. You must see things like that quite often.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah.
Speaker 1:I mean, whether it's a car accident, whether you work together with your with the fire department out in Fairmont. I mean, this stuff is happening all the time. Yeah, I mean, how does how do you control that as a human being, mental illness and all that? How, what, how does how does that affect you? I think that, yeah, you know what I'm saying. I mean, we're sitting here, we're talking, we're having a great conversation. I think, yeah, do you know what? There's that moment that it's like oh my god, you know what I just saw maybe go to your wife and say you know what just happened today? I, I don't know if I can do this anymore. How do you, how do you handle all that?
Speaker 2:well. How how I do it and and how it should be done, or two completely different things okay, but everybody's different.
Speaker 2:You know, and I think it's you know, my way of dealing with it is the, the old, the old way. You know that that isn't the right way now, but you know you don't talk about it, you keep it inside. You know you suck it up and move on. And you know, and it's, it's tough, but you think about Some of these scenarios that you know, I think first responders at law enforcement, fire there's, there's some studies out there that give you some numbers of how many Critical incidents that you see in a career and it's, it's in the thousands. You know, and you know I have I probably on two hands I can count some some very, you know, traumatic, critical incidents that you know that I've I've been involved in. Remember and you know, when you mentioned kids, that the most, the most, this was only a couple years ago, but probably one of one of the worst recently in the last maybe five years.
Speaker 2:My daughter was, I think she was two years old and we had a. We had a death that I was our detective sergeant. I got called in for a death of a two-year-old and you know, and and I knew when I got there and then they told me that the girl had died. You know it was a. It was a tough, you know I knew I was like this is gonna be a rough night for everyone.
Speaker 2:Yeah, our guys are our patrol officers, you know responded and we're there within minutes, did everything that they could to try to try to save this little girl. You know, one of them one of them had had kids similar to same age as mine and that was on duty sergeant and a couple of the younger guys and that was that was. That was really tough, you know, and you know you have to break the news to the family and have that element involved and and afterwards, you know it's, you know, watching. So I was the on-call detective, detective, investigator in our office that so I I took did most of the investigation after the the, the initial that our patrol people did, and Looking at the pictures, you know I Going through and familiarizing myself with it and you know I could see this.
Speaker 2:This little girl had very similar Characteristics of my daughter and oh my goodness, and oh my you know it took me, it took me probably about a month Actually write my report because every time I had opened it it was there. It just came right back and you know, and it was tough for a lot of us, but that that's just one incident, you know that. But yeah, you know, holding it in certainly isn't the right thing. That you know. That's the way you handle it. Yeah, yeah, you know, you're condition I would want to get it out.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, I would want to go to somebody that I can talk to and Just say whatever I'm feeling.
Speaker 2:Yep and get it out.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it could be laughter, there could be tears, that could be all that, and just get it out.
Speaker 2:Oh, so you know the stigma that exists with, with mental health, you know, in our society still exists and yeah, you know, and there's a lot of people out there that are, that are, you know, doing very good things, you know, to try to, you know, break down that stigma and sure, and you know, but but that exists and you know, you, there's a lot of fear, you know, especially for cops. You know you have that issue. The first thing that you think about is I'm gonna lose my job, you know, and so so you know you have to be tough, you know, mentally, physically, and you know so, so that that stigma exists and I come from.
Speaker 2:You know my, my dad's side of the family all being. You know World War two. You know Marines and whatnot. That you know, I think, part of that.
Speaker 1:You know that that toughness and your brother was a murray.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, yeah, you know so, so that I think that plays a part in it. And then you know where I, where I came from, where I started my career and the early parts of my career. It's you didn't talk about that stuff because, because you were, you were made fun of, you know. So you get conditioned to you know and and everyone handles it differently, you know you turn to turn to alcohol or some people.
Speaker 2:Yeah yeah, drugs or other substances and you know. But but talking about it certainly is. You know it definitely helps for me. You know it's tough talking to the wife. I think she knows when something's bothering me, but I don't like showing that weakness.
Speaker 1:I you know you know, but no, you're right, you have to give as much credit to the spouses as you know, to you being the chief and the officers as well, because and not you know I was fireman for a lot of years in chief, so it you got to have that support and you know what they know you.
Speaker 1:They get to know you so well. They could probably just look at you and go. But it's interesting and some of the comments that we're getting. Of course, your mom chimed in. Hi guys, do you know a Don Shaver? Hey, I rode with me as a rookie.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, yeah down, down, trained me a little bit of clay.
Speaker 1:Daniel Michael, my sister loved this. Awesome. Oh, this is Bob. So apparently Bob doesn't have his own account. Hey, mike, and skip from a carry wrench. Oh, bill all said hello there. Bill, susan, I love this. Susan Bowman, yeah.
Speaker 1:I know, yeah, exactly, and you know she says always feels safe with CPD and FFD. Andrew won a code at On a dugger road Overroad, maybe I don't know and Adam Payne says hi, from beautiful East Tennessee. No boy here. Yeah, see, that's the nice thing about doing this. You know you can watch it from anywhere in the world which is cool, which is really cool.
Speaker 1:What other positions you see? You talked about being the detective, so when you start out, you start out on road patrol, is that what happens? And then? Then you can bid for other positions, or how does that work?
Speaker 2:Yeah, you know, I think a lot of it's productivity. Okay, how you, how you do your job. I at clay PD, I had a year on the job and they're like hey, you know, you're doing a great job, you've got knowledge and experience. As someone with five years on, we want you to start training people and so. So I got into training very early in my career when I worked security at the mall. I was. I was heavily involved in training programs there and then I became a. With two years on the job, I went to Evidence Technician School. I became an evidence technician.
Speaker 1:That's the process. Crime scenes.
Speaker 2:You know it, always putting the pieces of the puzzle you know together and actually solving the crime Are finding crucial pieces of evidence that link up an individual to the to the crime. You know that that was an awesome feeling when you do that huge accomplishment, yeah. But yeah, you know I. So I was an evidence technician, I worked road patrol for 10 years before I, before I, had the opportunity to become a detective and I I did the. It was a detective for a year and a half and then got promoted in 2016 to Sergeant. But I, you know I've been very fortunate to. I went to Became a crash reconstructionist.
Speaker 2:I was a member of our emergency services team, when, when we had that at Camelus PD, done it all I yeah, it's. You know there are certain other things, aspects of the job that I wanted to do, that that I Couldn't get to it in a small town department, but but in our department I've worked in pretty much every, every, I've worked every shift, every, every section that our police department has. You know the I'm not a bike officer, snowball, right, I?
Speaker 1:wanted to do that, but just never never, had that opportunity, it's good it can, almost doesn't have a bike. Oh no, they got the bicycle, it's not. We don't have a motorcycle.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that'd be dangerous, yeah escorts, you know oh yeah, the funeral escort or parades, and there are a few agencies that still use them for traffic enforcement.
Speaker 1:I got you, but but yeah it's, you know I.
Speaker 2:Had you know, the career goals. This was, this was a career, you know, becoming chief was a career goal. That that I always had. You know, I don't know if I ever I really took it seriously, like it was just, it was there, like a you know, and then the opportunity came up and you know, and here I am. I never really expected it to happen. Within my 20 year career, you know, I figured I'd I'd Retire from Camilla's and maybe get become a chief at like a part-time police agency or something I've known others.
Speaker 1:Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, but it.
Speaker 2:But but it it happened, you know, and it was, it was. You know it was surprising. I was, I was, you know, I was excited and you know if it's been a very challenging and difficult job, but but what makes it easy is the people that that I work with and you know we had, we really do have some some great officers and sergeants and good lieutenant and captain that you know. Even our support staff, you know our clerical workers, yeah, you know we, we truly do have a Very good police department.
Speaker 1:I believe it sounds and what I'm saying you know, and that's.
Speaker 2:So, so it's awesome. It's awesome to have moved up through the ranks of the department that you know In in the town that I grew up, when I know that's what I was saying.
Speaker 1:I'm sorry and that it's gotta be such a good feeling. Yeah except maybe when you had to pick up somebody that you've known.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it is what it's happened. Yeah, I know.
Speaker 1:I love this. We're getting lots of comments. Of course, jennifer Natoly. You know, jennifer, I got to meet and spend some time with Mike during helping heroes. You're such a nice guy and it was amazing with my daughter. Jennifer says shout out to SRO Charlie.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, cheesy Charlie. That's the only we gave him he. He sees he does a lot of pizza parties at on a dogger road, so oh, I like it. I think I went to school on a dogger road. This is my school. Yeah, I think Tim went.
Speaker 1:My brother Tim went there, wow, yeah that was a long time ago, not much as you know, it's interesting, as you go in the school.
Speaker 2:I mean a little changes, but a lot of it's still the same.
Speaker 1:So you say you have a great department under you, a lot of men and a lot of women. Everybody comes together and they do a Great job. Yeah, but you know, it doesn't matter how I say it, where I work to, we got a great staff. But there's always, sometimes there's something going on. And how do you, as chief, handle those situations? Maybe there's a, you know, a personality conflict or something like that. You're laughing, I know, but how do you? You're the head guy how?
Speaker 2:do you?
Speaker 1:handle something like that you know.
Speaker 2:He just try to try to resolve it with you know, by by being a human and Try to make them clean your office figure out. Yeah, I don't do that, you know you kidding it. Yeah, it really depends on the situation and the people that are there involved. At the end of the day, you know, most of those scenarios aren't the end of the world. Right, but but you know, if you have those, those conflicts you know it can be can interfere with your ability to make it a job or do your job.
Speaker 2:That's you know that's the one good thing about our, our department is that you know when it is time to do the job. Everyone puts that stuff aside and you know, works very well together and you know and that's awesome to see, it's always been that way. You know that's cool. I've seen that for the 24 years I've been around. Yeah, most please.
Speaker 1:No, yeah, exactly right, it's definitely great. But I just speak. You know, I know where I work and what I do with the radio station and you know Some days are better than others. Oh yeah, you know and, but yet I have to hit that mic every afternoon at two o'clock and be the happiest guy in the world. But, you know what, but I tried not to let that affect.
Speaker 1:Absolutely yeah, so I love what I do you know the other thing about you know doing what you're you're doing and you're the men and women under you when you You're first unseen of so many different Almost everything, because you're already there. You're on the road, you're, you're being dispatched, you're out the door when you're looking for rescue and fire. It's gonna take a few extra minutes because you know, by the time they get Trucks rolling and I've been there, done that, I get that, even though they're fast, love it, love it, absolutely love it. But because you guys are right there and they, they dispatch you right away you get there. So you're actually the first hands on. It's almost everything. It could be you know the rack, it could be a fire, maybe somebody's trapped. You're not gonna hesitate, you're gonna do what you can to get that person out of there. You know, if I were to cover, it might be a few minutes away.
Speaker 2:Yeah yeah, so even before, even before we get on scene, you know, the dispatchers are truly the first responders.
Speaker 1:They don't get the credit. They deserve.
Speaker 2:You know right, you know they're taking, you know, the call takers, the dispatchers. They're, they're the, they're the first ones that are getting involved in an incident and they're, you know, some of those calls are chaotic and, you know, very tense and you know, and they've got to be able to act very quickly at getting the right resources there to deal with that emergency, but also try to try to navigate through people that are that are, you know, very, very stressed out there. They're up here and I'm trying to bring those people down so that they can the dispatchers or cult takers can elicit the information that's needed To try to figure out what's going on. That that's a you know, that's a very you're right, it's good challenging job yeah.
Speaker 2:You know, and it kills me that to hear you know, with a lot of them They've got well. It's, I think it's a 30 year retirement and they have to be 55 To be eligible to retire. And you know, and a lot of the stuff that we deal with on scene. You know a lot of the stress of these incidents, you know they're. It's just as bad, if not worse, for them. You know, and to be in a career that long, you know I mean 20 years, I remember for me as a brand new cop, you know, holy crap, 20 years, 20 year career man, 20 years is gonna that's a long time. And now I'm at the, I'm at the end.
Speaker 2:I'll be starting my 20th year here in March. Yeah, and, and I'm like you know it's gone by in a blink of an eye 28 years old how?
Speaker 1:does that work? Look at me Um, yeah, that's so 30 years.
Speaker 2:you know, I can't imagine 30, 35 years and you know so. So I definitely you know for them it's, it's challenging for us to you know, and you know with the volunteer fire service there's a you know that's a thankless job to a lot of these guys put in a lot of time and and effort into volunteering and you know there's not enough. You know, and that's that's impacted Response times all over the place. You see it in the news. Yeah, I know they're talking about I think it's Vernon, vernon or Verona fire department with the turning stone, turning stone.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I saw that you know the Resources being strapped there and you know it is. It does exist but you got to make do and you make it. You know we're very fortunate and Camillus with with the variety of fire departments locally there all the fall. You know Every fire volunteer, fire department in that that section of the county Waves ambulance. You know we all work very, very well together. We're the sheriff's department, the state police.
Speaker 1:I was gonna ask about that, that whole relationship with other departments. I know you get the troopers I've seen the troopers of my neighborhood here and I'm in the town of clay, north Syracuse area so but everybody works together, not Still have no no, no, that's gone 2008.
Speaker 1:Long time ago, but I do remember that. I do remember that. But now we get the sheriff's soon. Yeah, of course, troopers. So it's just, it's crazy, mike, you're doing such a good job. Man, I'm just, we're just so proud of you, and I'm just reading a lot of these comments. Gordy says thanks, chief. My daughter is a call taker at 9-1-1. That's very cool. Yeah, it's very cool, and you get the respect. How is it? When you're out and about with friends, they tease you about what you do or you know, hey, it's my buddy, mike you know, the or they get pulled over and go hey, well, yeah, yeah, my best friends, mike, sure I.
Speaker 2:my friend Chris Gardner likes to. For that he jokes about it and my guess you know, he's, he's a, he's a comedian, he's the class clown. He's always. You know, I've known him since fifth grade, but but yeah, you know it, I Forget where we're going.
Speaker 1:You're talking about your buddy was the class.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, so yeah you know when I you know when I first became a cop, you know all my, all my buddies were, you know it was. Any time we went out it was like oh hey, what about this story? What about?
Speaker 2:that story and you know I'm glad that in people it always said you know You're gonna you're gonna get, you're gonna, you know you're gonna get new friends, the cop friends that you know you're just gonna want to hang out with cops because because no one else knows or understands what it's like to be a cop. And you know, and, and so I had a very close group of friends, you know, in high school and in our college days that that have stuck, stuck by me through thick and thin. And you know a couple of them my buddy, bill and Dan, who I've I've known since we were like five years old and you know they they're like my brothers and so you know the storytelling. You know it would get old and I'm like I, just I, you know. So now I, you know, when I'm out with with friends, like I don't want to talk about the cop stuff.
Speaker 2:I'm talking about normal life and right you know sports and all that and you know so but but but they're, you know they're excited to. The two of them were we're at my swearing in you know it was awesome to have those guys there and you know, and my Couple of my buddies from I was the only guy that was falling.
Speaker 1:I'm just telling you.
Speaker 2:It's cool, you know, it's good to have those, those non-cop friends, because you need their, their, their advice and you need to have that escape you know. I think that's why I, like you know, I, in the last two years I've really gotten more into live music and you know sport, obviously, sports, sports. I am a S you know I got SU football season ticket holder my cousin and group of friends and yeah, we gotta get your hooked up the baseball. Oh yeah, yeah, I can't wait to get the season tickets.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you should with the Mets, absolutely.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I'm looking forward to the, to the major league season. You know I'm excited about the SU football this year and all that's gonna be interesting, come on yeah. Yeah, it was, it was. It's been an exciting last month and a half with, with some of the you know, the Coaching changes the transfer.
Speaker 1:Transfer is like wow, okay, it always looks good in the beginning, though let's see what happens down the road.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we got to be positive, though that's something about, you know Syracuse fans are never, you know it's always doom and gloom and you know, but I like that.
Speaker 2:You know that that stuff is outside of the job. You know you got to be able to have that release and you know I had a, I think, and it even, you know, came up more, more so In the last year and a half, it two months after I was promoted, I had a friend, very close friend, that was in that group, commit suicide and you know, and that you know I think, really kind of changed my perspective with with friends and family and you know time is, you know time goes by in a blink of an eye and you know, unfortunately, with that that friend and my, my non-cop group there, I had so he was in a cop.
Speaker 1:He was in the non-cop. Yep, okay.
Speaker 2:Yeah, but I chose the job, the career. You know quite often over over time spent with those that group of friends, and that's something that Really has really affected me and you know that I you know I'm never gonna get that time back with that friend and you know I kick myself in the ass for it now. But yeah, but the only thing I could do now is try to try to you know, share that with people.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's definitely not because you know that career goes by fast and you got to have that outlet with all the crap that you deal with and you know there's there's a lot of you know positives to. You know the the best thing is interacting with People. I enjoy Talking with people. You know about anything and it's cool, you know, and that means that that's a great relationship If you can do that it's important you know, it's very important Yep, it's 90% of it right there is communication.
Speaker 2:I'm being cool, yeah, and listen. Listening is the big part, you know my wife says I never listen. We never.
Speaker 1:Get the same thing at home. Yeah, you listen everywhere else but here.
Speaker 2:Yeah, even the people that gave me advice, I didn't take their advice. Let's see, you should have listened, you'll hear that forever.
Speaker 1:What would you say is the highlight of your career?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean, yeah, I think, get it becoming.
Speaker 1:Chief coming to police department.
Speaker 2:You know that that was really the icing on the cake. You know it. You know I had an opportunity to bring our our department, you know into the future and you know I've got some very aggressive goals and so trying to achieve those, you know, and just just you know, making the place better than what I founded it. You know, yeah, you know you always want to do better and improve and you know, and working together as a team with people, but I think that's the highlight. What about a low? You know the low. You know I guess you know some of the, some of the critical incidents. You know you know we were. You can't help someone. You know that. That. You know you do everything that you can to try to save someone doesn't work, you know that's. That's probably the bummer.
Speaker 1:Yeah yeah. I get it you know there's.
Speaker 2:It's crazy because there's so many people. You know you think about how many contacts you have in you know a day. You know you know you're always engaging with people and you know you just you go from call to call at times and you know people that you've met, you've had great experiences with, and you know and, and you know they, they mentioned some.
Speaker 2:Hey, you remember this, you know you know, this, or you know you did that for me and you know it's, it's cool, you know it's it sucks that you don't remember some of that stuff, but you know. But the best part is when you have someone that comes up to you and says hey, you know, I remember you and you changed my life.
Speaker 2:You know you, you said this to me, you know 20 years ago and and and that has lived with me and that, really, what you told me, really impacted my you know my life and you know, and that's that's probably one of them, you know, yeah, one of the biggest reward. That's. That's that makes. That makes your day when you hear that it's not something that you expect. But you know you don't do the job for add a boys or or pets on my back.
Speaker 2:You do it because you love it. Do it because you love, you love doing it and you want to help you and helping and you're not looking for the other. Right right.
Speaker 1:Yeah. So being a police officer, I mean, is it tough to get officers now? Is it tough to? I heard from another source that it's very tough. You know they're offering these incentives, for example, I believe, the city of Syracuse.
Speaker 1:I was talking to my buddy, matt he was saying you know, they got like a ten thousand dollars sign-out, 20, 20. Now they're getting desperate but nobody's doing it. Yeah, you know, it's just even the transfer from a department into the city. It's so hard to get officers. I think their class was. I think the most recent class is way down, yeah, yeah they had to push back.
Speaker 2:They had to push back their Academy to there's.
Speaker 1:I think why do you think that is don't mean to?
Speaker 2:interrupt. I think politics has is one. You know that how things have changed in the last five years does that make you?
Speaker 1:does that make you nervous? You know, I would say a little bit.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean, you know you got to have. Part is that? Yeah, yeah it's, it's a. It's a wonderful career, you know it's. I mean, you know A lot of all the careers out there. I think you know, for me, that it was the only thing that you know. Once I got exposed to it, I was hooked, you know, and it is the greatest, the greatest career that I Think that's out there and yeah, you know, and you have a lot of.
Speaker 2:You know. You have a lot of people, I think, that are just because of everything that they've heard and seen and.
Speaker 2:You know about the career it's, you know it's not worth it and you know the retirement pension changes I think have affected it, you know. But yeah, you know you try to try to recruit people and you know in different ways of reaching people. You know there are people that are still interested and want to do the job and I give them all the credit in the world and wherever it may be. You know if they have that interest, you know they should.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I was reading here the way society treats police today is no wonder police have difficulty recruiting.
Speaker 2:Yeah, oh, absolutely yeah, that's a part of it, you know. You know for us, you know our community is, is, is wonderful. You know they support us. Yeah, you know we support them and you know you see it all the time, you hear it, and you know a lot of our officers. You know I don't think they they see it or hear it. You know as much as but but it's there, you know, and you know there's, there's a lot of subtle, subtle messaging out there from people too, that you know that you know the gestures and stuff you don't hear about every day, but but it does. You know it does exist and it's, it's awesome when you hear. You know I get emails, you know you get text messages from people or phone calls of hey, you know, I just wanted to share this with you, your officer did this, or you know your department handled this and you know, and it's and it's awesome, you know and that's that yeah.
Speaker 2:So so it's you know. Just reassures you that that that you know our department is doing what, what we're supposed to be doing, what's the Speed limit on what's Tennessee Street there in front of the PD?
Speaker 1:is it 35?
Speaker 2:35. Who put the?
Speaker 1:flashing light up there, that when you go over 35, that's, that's been that that was a speed sign.
Speaker 2:That was. It was don't. It was actually donated to us by one of the yeah, I go out to the hockey games all the time, and I every Sunday morning.
Speaker 1:I'm going oh, I'm doing 48.
Speaker 2:No, I know, Michael, I'll be good, I know the chief I'm fine, I'm fine, I just gotta get to the game. Yeah, yeah, sweet. We have a few of those there. I think it's a great idea to get them, you know, donated by, by local businesses.
Speaker 1:That's awesome.
Speaker 2:You know it helps us because we can't be everywhere. You know every, every second of the day and you know we're not. I think you know a lot of people when I ask, like how big do you think our police department is? Like all about 50, 50 officers, and you know and that's not the case.
Speaker 2:You know we're yeah yeah, and they're like you know. And yeah, you know our staffing levels. It aren't where it should be, you know, with people on patrol at any given time and you know our minimum staffing is minimum and shouldn't be where we're at right now.
Speaker 1:So you're looking to expand though a little bit. Oh yeah, you said that you're working with the town to put additional officers. On what is. What is like. Give me an example, arrange what is the starting salary of a police officer.
Speaker 2:Let's say, for example, in town of Camus yeah, so for us this year it Went up to. We have a probationary step. It's Around 52,000. All right, but then with still with some incentives, you know it goes up a little more with our. You know you get a uniform allowance. You know, you don't you sick leave. You get Incentive for that you know, there's some incentives built in. You know other agencies, you know we're probably in the middle right now.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so competitively.
Speaker 2:It can be challenging. You know every, every union is piggybacking off each other to try to try to boost salaries.
Speaker 1:What is the? I'm trying to see what general my glasses are dirty. Jennifer saying the community event that CPD does is nice. Last summer a few offices were racing in the Bount in depth about oh, in the bounce house Dairy ship bounce house. Kids loved it. Yeah, yeah so that's part of building that relationship. Yeah, you get out there with the kids, you have fun with the kids. That was hoops with the kids. Yeah, and our people do that.
Speaker 2:That's awesome it's, you know it's cool, it's, kids love it and and our officers love doing that too. Yeah, our community event that was the September, was our second year doing it. Our community social it was just, you know, it's like an open house for the police department where, where we have, you know, we had a lot of, lot of community involvement yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:Businesses donating to we need to bring the podcast out there next time you do it.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, yeah, I'll be, I'll bring skip happens out, we'll set it up.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, yeah, you change the name for the kids.
Speaker 2:Because you know how it'll come out.
Speaker 1:Hey mom, shit happens over here. Yeah, but no, what'd you say? But no, that'd be fun and I would love to you know, chat more with the officers, and even a community, yeah so you know it's something I'd love to do. As you know, I've been, I've been here all my life and, obviously, the relationship that we have with you guys, and I'll probably see you this weekend too. I know you may be watching this down the road, but I think we have a banquet, so oh yeah. She's not going.
Speaker 2:I'm gonna probably be in Buffalo. Oh, oh, jeez.
Speaker 1:Yeah, excuse me for a minute, you're gonna freeze your ass off. Yeah, I'm excited, that's. That's what. I was reading the forecast for Buffalo on the air this afternoon and it was 60 mile per hour, winds, heavy snow. You know that that polar vortex apparently is, yeah, dipping down, whatever the hell that is so.
Speaker 2:That's crazy. That's that's Buffalo playoff football weather now one time, all right.
Speaker 1:So all right, now you're out of the element as a cop. All right, it's the police chief. The big guy, the big man in the big chair Drives the next car.
Speaker 2:Sure no, I don't. I don't have the nicest car in the fleet. No, why not? You're the chief, that's I'm about.
Speaker 1:You know that's good, I kept my, I kept my investigator car.
Speaker 2:And yeah, I think it's yeah and you're on 24 seven called.
Speaker 1:Obviously, be the chief, they'll call you anytime.
Speaker 2:We rotate a duty chief. Oh, do you, captain?
Speaker 1:Okay. Yeah, you're all I mean, you're always so okay, let's all right, let's put the cop thing over here. So we got the bills coming up this weekend. You're, what time do you get to the stadium? You're talking about going up the day before.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so so we might, we might get up there Saturday night and stay at a hotel, and and then we'll probably You're non-cop friends. Yep, yep, yeah, one of my teaching buddies, we. So yeah, we'll probably get to try to park because the lots open at nine and you know we'll.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I know we're going to have our tent and I'll.
Speaker 2:Cook some, cook some food and like what do you cook?
Speaker 1:What do you tell gate with?
Speaker 2:Probably just to keep it simple Hot dogs and hamburgers, yeah you know price and junk.
Speaker 1:What's in the cool?
Speaker 2:He'll have his beers. I might have one, and I'm not a big drink.
Speaker 1:No, I know you're not, and I think that that's to be respected.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, yeah, I'm too old for that. Oh, don't even go there exactly but yeah, the, you know for SU. You know our group. You know everyone brings something and I like getting creative. You know I try to find a new recipe for each, each game and you know chicken wing dip, but you know I might make. I might make that for Sunday. Bring some of that with us, but we'll probably be there at 9 am and bundled up and into the stadium now the whole family owners, oh yeah just me and my friend, yeah, my friend Bill.
Speaker 1:I built. You've met him? Yeah, I'm sure I have he was he was.
Speaker 2:He was the guy that he did racing for a few years. Oh cool, dirt racing. Yeah okay, it was awesome, it's awesome, but yeah, so we were both bills fans. Sunday night we were going back and forth through a text message and I said hey if they win. Let's go tickets, and so we found found a couple of tickets.
Speaker 1:There's gonna be a lot of people heading up there on Saturday. I think you see a lot of bills flags on cars Going west trying to try to research hotels. Oh, good luck, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, they're. Most of them are sold out in that whole.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you're gonna pay a fortune.
Speaker 2:But yeah, $500 or well might be worth it. Yeah.
Speaker 1:I.
Speaker 2:I'm excited, I can't, I can't wait.
Speaker 1:You know, I know it's gonna be fun. Now, if they win here, then they move on to the divisional game and right.
Speaker 2:They'll play. They'll play at home again the following Sunday, let's hope exciting well the advantage is they are playing in Buffalo.
Speaker 1:Buffalo's used to the cold, used to this. No, I don't know how Pittsburgh is, but I think Pittsburgh, pittsburgh is. Yeah, that's true.
Speaker 2:So yeah, it's not gonna be the coldest game, though they're saying the Kansas City Miami.
Speaker 1:Oh, I did hear that. I heard that today Chill out like negative negative something yeah. That's crazy.
Speaker 2:I bet you they don't even feel it, though, because they're so hyped up, it's just on the go, on the go.
Speaker 1:So you know we've been chatting with the Chief. Michael Shrier happens to be, you know he's a family friend as well proud to say I'm his godfather and it's just.
Speaker 1:It's been a great conversation. I said, dude, you got to come over, we got to talk about what you do, because I think it's very important that we get the message out about. You know what it's like to be a police officer, what you go through day in, day out, just all the good, all the bad, and you know just why should others become a police officer? I mean, there's a good example of it right here. It's just I do. I do worry, you know, I worry about you. I've got other friends that are out there Just because the way, as Gordy said, the way society is no, and what's going on and what people think they can do, and you know they, everybody thinks they know the law, but they don't know the law.
Speaker 1:Am I correct by saying that it's like? What do you mean? You can't do that? For example, I Watch, like these youtube videos. I know I guess it could be your enemy too or it could be your best friend, but you know I like, if you ever watched Um, it's frank um on podría that that, that different things going on in the car, not rated PG.
Speaker 1:Yeah, exactly Wow.
Speaker 2:Some yeah, there's some bizarre stuff. You know, that's the one interesting thing too, because it's never the same. Exactly, it's never the same thing every day, and you know, that's what makes it exciting and certainly challenging. You know I like being challenged and I think that's you know, that's you know. One of the reasons I think I like being a chief is you know your face daily with problems, a lot of small problems but some big challenges and problems that you know, affect things long term, short term.
Speaker 2:And you know I'm not one to like, I don't like things being easy. I like the challenge. I'm not afraid, you know, someone told me today is because I don't like talking. I never like talking about myself, right, you know, like with our accomplishments, I don't look at, I don't look at, sit there and say, oh, look, look, look what I did. Or look what we did, it's, you know, we accomplish it. Hey, that's great. On to the next thing, you know. So, yeah, it's. The challenge is just the unknown, you know, of the camaraderie, the teamwork and doing good for your community. You know some people think like, oh, it's, you know it is.
Speaker 2:it's easy to get discouraged with everything that you see and hear, but you know the satisfaction of doing good is one of the most rewarding things, as well so it's a great career and you know, if people I tell people if you're up for a challenge and you want to help people and do good for your community, you know, and be a part of a team, you know take the test and work towards being a police officer, you know a lot of people will sit around and wait for the agency to come to them, and that's you know. There are academies out there where you pay your way, like I did, and you know there's a local one. It was at Kazanovia. Now it's down at SUNY Morrisville, but hopefully on OCC we'll bring theirs back. That's the one that I went to. That was a great academy and they did that every year.
Speaker 1:Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, so hopefully, it'll yeah.
Speaker 2:The pre-employment academy is usually the easier to a year yeah.
Speaker 1:I thought so what before we let you go here? Wow, we've been chatting an hour, doesn't?
Speaker 2:seem it, I don't know. Well, that's good, I guess, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:Um, what is the as a police officer? Okay, you're the top guy. I have to say that. I have to say that over and over again. But, um, I get pulled over. What? What should I? How should I react? What should I do? Just for anybody watching this, I think you know I've gotten tickets, I've been pulled over. I almost got pulled out of the car once. Uh, learned not to talk back to a police officer. Um, this is my wife off the funny story, if you don't mind. And everybody I don't know. Now everybody's going to know this story. But we're driving back from the outer banks and we're on 95. You've been on 95.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:You know, everybody does 95 pretty much right. So I'm cruising along and I'm probably doing 85. I mean, I'm going to be honest with you. But I'm going with traffic and I look in my rear view mirror, or my side mirror rather, and I'm in the passing lane and I see this uh trooper coming up to shoulder. He pulls in behind me, he pulls me over and he goes. Uh, he asked me for my license and registration and he goes. Uh, you're following that Dodge Charger pretty close. What's going on? I go I didn't see a Dodge Charger. He goes. There was a Dodge Charger in front of you and you guys playing. Again, I said I didn't see a Dodge Charger and I think I started to piss him off because I honestly didn't see it.
Speaker 2:He was talking Right.
Speaker 1:Right, he goes. You know I'm filming this, and blah blah. I said I don't care what you're doing. There was no Dodge Charger there, you know, and uh, he goes, there was and he goes if you you need to stop, or you know?
Speaker 2:blah, blah, blah and my wife's like going honey, just need to quiet. We got to get home.
Speaker 1:You know y'all have had some of my wife about this afterwards, but that was not the way to react. I should have just gone with it, said I'm sorry, officer, whatever, but I mean. Okay. Going back to my original question, how should I act if I get pulled over by a police officer?
Speaker 2:Yeah, you want to be respectful, and but do what they tell you to do, don't you know? Reaching for things is always a no. No, because you know, as the officer goes up to the car you don't know what they're reaching for.
Speaker 2:So the best thing is, you know you have your, have your documents ready hands where you know, usually easiest put your hands on the steering wheel and you know when they ask you for, for your documents, tell them where it is and you know is it okay to reach. You know, you know, and that dialogue is important.
Speaker 1:Put your hands on the wheel and wait for them to come, and they haven't. Do they do they have to identify themselves?
Speaker 2:I mean, every department has different policy. Yeah, okay, that's why I asked you in the beginning of this podcast.
Speaker 1:how would you identify yourself if you pulled me over?
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, so that's you know we train our officers to. You know to identify yourself right away. And you know and tell the person the reason for the stop.
Speaker 1:Do you have to tell them the reason?
Speaker 2:At some point you're supposed to you know, but but not necessarily initially, but the easy thing to do for you, so that you don't get that back and forth and you know part of the shut up. It's that you know. Identify yourself. This is the reason I stopped you. Is there any any explanation for why you're doing what I was trying?
Speaker 1:to explain.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you know, there's there's a certain process, but, but you know, it all depends on how that person is. But if you, you know, let them identify themselves, explain the reason, versus being, you know, accusatory or questioning why, why'd you stop me? You know. But the biggest thing, you know, that type of stuff you can deal with.
Speaker 2:It's just how you communicate it and and communication yeah right, Communication is key and you know but, but, but don't make those quick. You know movements around, you know you see people. You know you know people that are digging through the gub box and then you know there's. You know, oh yeah, my handgun's there. You know, yeah, yeah, no, I get it. Or nowadays, look at the vehicles.
Speaker 1:Nowadays they get all these different compartments you got. Oh yeah, yeah, you know I mean in my, in my car I've got the, you know the center found soul and all that. So you would say that if I'm, if I get pulled over, make sure my hands stay on the wheel. Yeah, listen, yep, yep, and now. So during the stop, though, they do have to tell you why you've been pulled over, yeah.
Speaker 2:All right, they should, but, but no, no, and they should and I would expect them to.
Speaker 1:But I've, because I've been watching some YouTube videos. It'd be like they go. Why'd you pull me over? Well, I'll tell you after you show me your ID.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:And he's like I don't have to show you my ID Now. Do you have to show it?
Speaker 2:I would what if I didn't want to?
Speaker 1:show you my ID. I mean, I would have to if you asked for it.
Speaker 2:Right, yeah, yeah you, there's a See, that's a law.
Speaker 1:I think people are like no, I don't have to show you my ID. It's not a law I don't get.
Speaker 2:I'm trying to say Right, right, right, yeah, you know, if you're you're pulled over for an offense you know you have to, you have to provide your, your identification, you know, and if you don't, then New York state, that's a problem.
Speaker 2:You know that the old, the old way of of doing it and it's still. It's still a way of you know when you're you're handling a traffic stop. You know, yeah, I'll tell you as soon as you hand me those documents. That was a way of you know, having some control. But reality of it, what difference does it make if you just tell the person? Right now because a lot of times I'll give you a new.
Speaker 1:Let's piss them off.
Speaker 2:You know, and that by, by, by telling them up front, you know, then that that helps with, you know, easing that, that that tension or that that doubt or uncertainty, and you know, it sets it sets the stage for you know what you're going to do and how you're going to handle that. And if you come across like, I'll tell you as soon as you hand me those documents. You know, I've experienced that because I've done that before. That's how we were trained. But it can become adversarial.
Speaker 1:And then now you're in a stalemate.
Speaker 2:You're you know so, you know, giving, I go up to a car and you know, hey, I'm so-and-so with the Camille's Police Department. The reason I stopped you is for this, you know. Is there any reason? You know, okay, do you have your license registration? You know there you go ask those questions and okay, this is what I'm going to do. I'll be right back to sit right here. Stay in your vehicle Now what is an?
Speaker 1:I know we're man. I got so many questions.
Speaker 2:That's all good, but um, all right.
Speaker 1:So you get stopped and when you go back to your car, that officer will know everything about you because, believe it or not, everything about you whoever it is, or it could be me will come up on that computer, right? You'll know my date of birth, you'll know whether or not I got insurance, you know whether-.
Speaker 2:Yeah, basic stuff.
Speaker 1:Basic stuff. You know whether or not I've been. You know I have a warrant, whether you know even though hopefully you know last I knew I was good. Yeah, so Tim Campbell, let's see what he's saying. Great to see this chief. It can be easy in today's society, with everyone with a camera wanting to be a YouTube sensation. Well, like it's good entertainment for me. Trying to goad the officer into an argument makes law enforcement job that much tougher. And you know I was wrong to do what I did. I know that.
Speaker 2:It happens and my wife still reminds me of that every time we take a trip to the other banks.
Speaker 1:That time you hit New York plates going through Virginia. Don't do it again.
Speaker 2:Everyone has a bad day too, you know?
Speaker 1:Yeah, I know.
Speaker 2:It's not. You know everyone perceives things differently and that's the hard part is how do you navigate through that when you have two different perceptions of what something is or isn't? You know the only way you can do it is try to. There's got to be some compromise, but you got to be able to communicate. You know and that's for some people it's easier said than done when you watch the stuff on YouTube, you know there's a lot of good stuff out there. There's a lot of bad stuff too. You know A lot of good ways of doing things, but then there's, you know, there's the YouTube. You know creators that hey, this is how you do search. Then you know yeah.
Speaker 2:You see, like because I'm a firearms instructor and you see some things that on YouTube that firearms instructors will put out there is, you know, hey, this is the way I do it and you know that's a you know, and you talk to other firearms people.
Speaker 1:And they're like no.
Speaker 2:Oh, that's, yeah, yeah, that's you know this guy has no spirit.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, yeah Well, like you said, there's a good and a bad, oh yeah, yeah, yeah, All the science to YouTube.
Speaker 2:I mean, this is the best, this is the good side of it. Yeah, this is the good side.
Speaker 1:And then and the other good side is it helped me put a ceiling fan in the bathroom this past weekend, so all that worked out well. I had YouTube going and I was doing it, so it was a little bit crazy. My wife's like do you know what you're doing? I go no, oh, YouTube will tell me I'm watching the video.
Speaker 2:Yep, I've done that.
Speaker 1:Take the red wire and and wire nut it to the other red one. Okay, it's done, that's fine. Yeah, but no, this has been a great conversation and it's a lot of fun and hopefully somebody watching this will know that you know, being a cop it's a good thing, law enforcement is a good thing, and we need more people like you. We need more people that have the desire and the passion and the will to go out there and protect others, because that's what you do it's to protect and serve. You see that?
Speaker 1:on the cars, all the they still say that on the cars. Some do, yeah, yeah, some do.
Speaker 2:Or the other ones been pulled up. But no, it's just that you know the different different, different graphics schemes. You know there's some pretty crazy ones out there and who decides on that?
Speaker 1:Let's say you want to. You know I know what the scheme is right now for CPD, but who decides? You know we want to change this logo up. That be you Some agencies.
Speaker 2:It is.
Speaker 1:I go to the town board and it's like I mean I think I think internally, you know, when we get our next fleet?
Speaker 2:we had a committee that that I chaired when I was a sergeant. Oh cool, and our, our?
Speaker 2:we came up with was shot down by by our chief then, and it is what it is. But but, but you know things like that. You know you get buy in and try to try to. You know have, have a committee, include people, and that it's you know. I think that's important. You know I don't know everything. It's not always my way or the highway, and you know I think we no, and you're open to that though. Oh, you have to. Yeah, it's the same way with me being.
Speaker 1:You know who I am with the wolf it's, you know. Okay, I want it this way, but your idea is not too bad.
Speaker 2:Right, right, yeah, yeah, you have to. You have to do that. It's important. You know it's there. Our people, you know they have a lot of good ideas and you know a lot of people are afraid that, well, if I share an idea and it doesn't get accepted, you know that I just give up and you know, and that's, you know, trying to change that and get people to to.
Speaker 2:You know if they, if they have a good idea, present it. You know pitch it Because you know there's not just one way of doing something and I'm up for, you know, doing things differently than you know just because it's been done a certain way for so long doesn't mean it's the right way or the only way you know there are a lot of good ideas out there and times are changing too.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and you know technology and all that, I'm sure, especially doing what you're doing. What about the media? Is it a good thing? Is it a bad thing? Yeah, you know, I mean I.
Speaker 2:Overall, don't be afraid.
Speaker 1:I mean, I work in radio and I'm an entertainer Okay, I play the music, so I'm not a news person or anything like that, but I have Some local news and I won't just because I know a lot of people that do that. But it's like I'll see a headline and go why did they write it like that? It's like the cop did nothing wrong, but they make it sound like the cop did something wrong.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's or it's perception you know they don't, you know they want perception and what you know. I yeah, it's. You know, we do have a lot of good local media. We're lucky we do, we do and Some of our, you know, in law enforcement, our PIOs, you know Matt. Yeah, jack Keller, from on.
Speaker 1:Jack is great. He's been doing it forever yeah our captain Nightingale didn't a great job on the news the other night, by the way.
Speaker 2:Yeah, thank you. You know those, though. You know they put together a luncheon last year for law enforcement and media to try to try to discuss them.
Speaker 2:You know and work together on on, you know, information sharing and getting getting information out there. You know what one of, I guess my one of my biggest things with with media and it's sad. You know our, our culture thrives on bad news. You know, and and you know, and, and I actually I talked with a reporter who does some freelance stuff for Syracuse comm about she's highlighting the good that Dantone does and she's gonna be putting out a story on that and Nice, so so she interviewed me about, about what he does in our community.
Speaker 2:You know, and and I was like man when Dan first called me about it probably kill me for talking about this, but but you know he said, hey, you don't have to do this, but you know this is what's happening. Oh, and you know, and he's a very humble person too. He doesn't, he doesn't want the spotlight, right and all that you know, but but he does really good, good things and you know I was like, oh, this is awesome. You know someone you know they're putting the story together and this and her, her segment, her articles about the good that people do, and that's, you know, that's something that.
Speaker 1:I would like to see more of and that was you know.
Speaker 2:We were talking about you know podcast and creating that, like that that's you know, highlighting the good that people do it's. I wish there was more of that in the news, versus all the doom and gloom right. The world's falling apart, and it is.
Speaker 1:It's you know, it's it's challenging but there's a lot of good and I think there's more good than bad and. Yeah, I would love to hear from a lot of those people. I mean, I would open up my door and say come in, sit with me at this podcast table let's, let's talk about what you do and why you do. Yeah, you know that that's we need to do more.
Speaker 2:I wish we focused more on that, you know, because if you, you know you focus on negative, you're gonna, you're always gonna be negative and if you focus on the good things, the positive things, then I think, naturally, you know, good comes out of that, and that's that's one of the. I guess one of the things that frustrates me is it's always, it's always the bad stuff that it gets high with a little good. But I wish there was more of that.
Speaker 1:Oh, so there's a post on here. You probably can't read it up there. I don't. Hey, chief, just a FYI, the. He just saw a story on Facebook. Take it, for what do you want, bill? Steelers game might be moved to Cleveland.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I saw that too. That's crazy. I got I'll go to Cleveland. Lynn doesn't know that yet.
Speaker 1:She does.
Speaker 2:Now I saw that earlier, but I didn't know if that was, if that was, you know, just just social media. Yeah, you never know. Yeah, yeah, it could be somebody's experience. Yeah, oh yeah.
Speaker 1:We all know that Mike Verone says high skip thanks for your service chief. Yeah, so it's kind of cool. Thank you, I mean chief of police, camilla's, and you know we have a lot in common, or you know his dad. I were best, best friends and Michael's actually my godson. So it's like did I say Godfather before you said? You said you were my godfather, you're my god, so that's what I did say.
Speaker 2:What the hell was I see, skip happens.
Speaker 1:It just occurred to me.
Speaker 2:I said that yeah, speaking speaking to my dad, we're going taking him to his first NASCAR race, where?
Speaker 1:are you going over? Oh, it's over the one, that's the mile, the. What are they calling it? The Really call it something.
Speaker 2:Yeah, anyway, it's an April, so we're me and Leonard going to Daytona for the 500 we went to.
Speaker 1:Nashville to the speedway back in you know that was pretty cool because they brought it back. I guess they weren't there for a bunch of years and yep.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it was crazy. Yeah, I'm excited. I think he is too. We're gonna go, for I'm taking him down Saturday. We'll spend the night, might go to Xfinity series race and then do the.
Speaker 1:Those are the fun ones, you know because you use a lot of cars. Oh yeah, yeah, I think it's a little crazy. Yep, yeah, it was fun, michael, I can't believe I said that, you know I see that it doesn't know it.
Speaker 2:No, you're my godson what I say. I'm your godfather.
Speaker 1:It is what it is. It's gonna happen. It's crazy. I can't believe that. That's my age. So it's, it's what's happening. All right, michael Schreyer, the police chief, camilla's police department. Thank you for all the the great info. Thank you for doing what you're doing.
Speaker 1:You know I totally respect you and everybody on your force, all and any of the first responders and you brought up a good point, especially the dispatchers, people the call takers the call takers and the dispatchers, and then it goes out to you guys and then it's Y'all come Gets a little crazy, but thanks for hanging out in the pods of tonight's place pretty cool.
Speaker 2:I love it. I love watching the podcast and yeah, a little Zach attack the dad once in a while.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah well, he loves you too. He knows you're a big baseball fan, but if you heard you say the red socks, he would not be Anyways chief, thank you for being here.
Speaker 1:I know a lot of people have been watching this. Thank you for your support. You want to go on YouTube and go to skip happens and make sure you subscribe and you're gonna see a whole lot more of these. Every once in a while we get the country artists in. You know that you've seen those two and a great relationship with Nashville, so you'll see them here, as well as with the radio station 92.1 the wolf here in Syracuse, we are, as a matter of fact, tomorrow is the very first one when we bring a member of the community in and we do a podcast called the inner Harbor cast. So, yeah, you'll hear more about that real soon. So thanks for being here, mike.
Speaker 2:It's good seeing you brother, you too.
Speaker 1:All right, thank you. Have a good night everybody. Thanks for watching easy Boom.