MARANA- The Marana Police Department is offering its officers cutting-edge leadership training through a state program.

The department recently hosted an AZPOST leadership course for its officers and law enforcement around the State of Arizona.

“It is a leadership program that AZPOST has developed for first line police supervisors around the State of Arizona. It is a four day class, 30 hours of classroom, where they’re interacting and receiving instruction on basic leadership concepts of how to interact with employees, proper treatment of each other in the workplace and employees and proper treatment of the public and the community as well,” said Ron Bayne, Law Enforcement Leadership Trainer.

“The goal from Arizona POST is to advance leadership in policing in Arizona.”

“I was recently promoted to Sergeant and being in this profession you work with people and people are different so you have to be aware and acknowledge that as a leader in this department you have to be successful and a role model. This class is definitely helping me become a better leader,” said Sergeant Jose De La Torre with the Marana Police Department.

“I’ve been a Sergeant for almost three years and what I like about this training is I think it can be applied no matter rank or tenure,” said Sergeant Erin Ysaguirre.

Ysaguirre went on to say that the training was a good reminder of how you should treat your people on a day to day basis.

“You have to care about your people especially if you expect them to return that to the every day citizen that they encounter especially on a job like this where we go through stress every day. We deal with stuff the general public has no idea about… you have to ensure that they’re okay every day before they go out on patrol in every capacity,” said Ysaguirre.

“I’m a newly promoted Sergeant and I’ve been with the organization since 2014,” said Sergeant Renee Huerta with the Marana Police Department.

Huerta is one several leaders from the department to participate in the training.

“I think especially as a new sergeant, being a new supervisor, I think it is probably the best thing you can do being newly promoted. It kind of really defines what it means to be a leader so you maybe have some ideas of what that means and then this really clarifies it and puts it into perspective.”

Retired law enforcement Commander turned trainer, Ron Bayne, said it is a critical time in policing right now.

“The last couple of years of policing in America have been contentious at best and some of the events that have happened in other parts of the country involving law enforcement has become one of the biggest social issues in the United States and Arizona is trying to be out in front of that,” said Bayne.

Bayne went on to say, “The people in the ranks in this profession are good people who are also community members of the public who want to be policed the right way. They’re caring people, they are people with their own families with their own lives, they’ve got children themselves, they’ve got spouses and significant others and when we see bad actions on the news or we hear about in social media coming from law enforcement it pains nobody more than those of us who work within the profession because it is not an accurate representation of the people within this profession.”

“We have a lot of talented wonderful cops in this agency, male and female and getting to mentor both is to me a privilege and I love doing it,” said Sergeant Ysaguirre.

“We really care about our community. We answer every call for service and I think we’re always very professional. We all love what we do and we’re proud to be representatives of the Town,” said Sergeant Huerta.

“I want the public to know that they’re in good hands and they’re going to be treated with respect, honesty and integrity,” said Sergeant De La Torre.

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