Chief Klein stresses safety

by Cori Hilsgen

news@thenewsleaders.com

In Minnesota, residents tend to spend more time outside gathering and celebrating memorable occasions when the weather is nice. Many of those occasions include drinking adult alcoholic beverages.

St. Joseph Police Chief Joel Klein said behavior with alcohol is always a concern, and he would like to remind people to behave responsibly when they drink.

Klein said his department’s first main concern is public safety and safety of individuals.

“Obviously, we have a job to do and we have zero tolerance on alcoholic issues,” Klein said. “When we deal with issues, most likely someone will receive a citation or get arrested.”

He said he understands being young, but his department advises responsibility.

“If you are not upsetting your neighbors or doing things to draw attention to yourself, then nobody is going to bother you,” Klein said. “It’s when you are doing things to hurt others, damaging other people’s property, disrupting the neighborhood with noise and things like that, you are going to get our attention and we are going to have to deal with it.”

He said many of the calls the department receives in the evening are alcohol-related. If they receive a call for vandalism, noisy gatherings, medicals, fights or more, they generally know there will be alcohol involved.

Klein said incidents increase more in spring because people are out more, due to better weather conditions. They want to go places and see other people. In winter it’s colder and people stay home more.

Klein’s staff is usually increased in spring and fall, especially on weekends because that’s when they see increased activity.

There are also special patrols out for Toward Zero Deaths, a program to monitor impaired driving, distracted driving, seatbelt compliance, speed control and more. Those patrols are out all year.

According to the Minnesota Toward Zero Deaths website, the approach is based on the belief even one traffic-related death on our roads is unacceptable. Created in 2003, Minnesota TZD is the state’s cornerstone traffic-safety program, which employs an interdisciplinary approach to reducing traffic crashes, injuries and deaths on Minnesota roads.

St. Joseph and other agencies in Stearns County participate in TZD and have extra patrols who cover for it.

Klein said party-goers might think the police department is just trying to ruin people’s fun, but it’s more about keeping everyone safe.

“Always be responsible, always have somebody that can look after you,” Klein said. “If you choose to indulge in a beverage that can cloud your judgment, please have somebody who can be responsible for you, and make sure you are not hurting yourself or others.”

He gave an example of a recently intoxicated person who was on his way to a party at 3 p.m. Since the person was very intoxicated, Klein stepped in and told the person to stop drinking.

The person was legally of age to be drinking, and Klein said he was booed by other party-goers at first, but then some of the party-goers who were not impaired stepped up and offered to take care of him. Klein advised them to make sure they helped the intoxicated person get home safely and that he was placed on his side while resting so he would not aspirate.

“I’m trying to save his life,” Klein said. “Whether anything would have happened or not, I don’t know, but based on our training and experience, we know things can happen. It’s preventable, so it’s frustrating (when) these preventable things happen.”

He advises to have a safety net always with someone you can trust.

“I’m not saying don’t have a good time and enjoy yourself,” he said. “I’m saying just be responsible and think about what you are doing.”

Klein said he would rather prevent an incident from happening. If someone says they can’t drive home, officers will help figure out a way to get them home.

He said the colleges were very helpful this year and helped fund extra patrols during times of increased celebration.

“Safety is number one and we have to enforce laws,” Klein said.

He said they issued tickets for things like underage possession and consumption, urinating in public and open container in public, but because they had enough staff working the events, it wasn’t chaotic.

He said a lot of people from other colleges often come to the events and create problems.

Visitors to the area also create many of the incidents that occur during the summer months. Klein said as graduation parties begin, summer weddings take place and other fun summer events occur, be mindful, bring your tent, bring your sleeping bag, find a room and sleep it off. Just be smart.

“There are a ton of good people out there,” Klein said.  “St. (Joseph) residents, the college students are great, but there are always going to be people (who) take it over the top and then that’s when we end up dealing with stuff. We would be happy if everything was just status quo and we didn’t have to do these things. Our job is dealing with public safety. People want to feel safe. They want to feel they don’t have to worry about something happening to them in their town or where they are at.”