Port Lavaca TX Jan 10 2013
Lupe Flores said he has enjoyed his time as a reserve police officer with the Port Lavaca Police Department.
On Friday, Flores celebrated 30 years with PLPD. It was a softball game in the early 1980s that introduced him to the law enforcement field.“It’s really, really funny. I was watching a softball game at the softball field and it was the police department playing against the fire department and I was sitting there watching,” he said. “The chief at that time looked up in the stands. They were missing a shortstop so he said ‘Why don’t you come play shortstop.’”
Flores was not an officer at the time of the game.
“I wasn’t an officer then so I went and played shortstop for him and after the game, he said ‘Okay now, I’ve committed myself and I committed you so you’ve got to get into law enforcement,’” he said. “That’s where it started, kind of crazy. That’s the way it started. I’ve been with this department ever since.”
To become a volunteer officer, Flores went on to attend training.
“It started out, of course, going to school. So I had to go to a school. At that time, they were just 80 hours. You went through it and you became an officer. At that time, they called them reserve officers,” Flores said. “A few years went by and we had a full academy, a police academy. I attended that whenever they had it, myself and 30 or 40 others.”
As a reserve police officer, Flores did work similar to that of a full-time officer.
“We have an eight-hour mandatory time we have to put in a month, but most of us put in more than that. That includes community-type service, working parades, doing fingerprinting for the (Texas) Child Find program, things like that,” he said.
Flores added that the reserve officers have the same authority as a paid officer.
“Well, we man the streets,” he said. “We respond to all types of calls. At one time, we were...doing all the paperwork that was necessary. You went out and you made a DWI stop and we did the paperwork. You responded to a burglary, we did the paperwork.”
Flores and the reserves even had to put in additional work when several members of the department got the ‘Blue Flu,’ he said.
“One time the police department got a bad case of the ‘Blue Flu.’ That’s when the officers in uniform get sick collectively, so the reserves, we manned the streets. We did everything,” he said.
Flores said that one time during the ‘Blue Flu’ one of his fellow reserve officers issued more driving while intoxicated citations than regular officers.
“You’d pull out of the police station, there was somebody acting stupid. It just happened to us. We took care of business. We protected the city. That went on about maybe a week and then people started feeling better,” he said. “Everything that was being contended was being resolved and they came back. We manned the city for a short period of time. We chipped in.”
During the ceremony held Friday, PLPD Chief James Martinez thanked Flores for service to the department and to the city.
“I just want to publicly thank Lupe for his 30 years of service to the community and to the police department and to let you know just how much we appreciate all you’ve done,” Martinez said. “Law enforcement has come a long way and you’ve been a part of it and you’ve contributed a lot and I wanted to thank you very much.”
When Flores was not working with the police department, he worked at Alcoa and eventually retired from there as a superintendent when his wife, Nena, passed away. After retiring from Alcoa, he went on to work as a security officer for Travis Middle School and worked there through last September.
“After that I stayed retired for about a year,” he said. “I got a call from a principal at the schools and they said ‘I’d like for you to come over here and go to work,’ and I did. I was there for six years.”
While there he helped keep the campus safe, he said.
“I was responsible for the security on campus. I responded to every request from the teachers and the staff when we had any kind of problem, dealt with unruly students. I had to take a few to jail. It was not uncommon to give tickets, actual citations,” Flores said.
Although he will no longer work with PLPD, Flores said he still plans to stay busy. In addition to doing work on his new house, he also serves on the board at the Cal-Com Federal Credit Union.
“I don’t feel like I can just hang up my gun and hang up my spurs. I recently purchased a house in town. I have a house at Six Mile, but I purchased one in town and I am remodeling it, so that’s keeping me really, really busy,” he said.
Flores said that his time with the department has been great and added that now is the right time to say good-bye.
“I’m going to miss all of this. I really am, because when you’ve done something for so long, and I actually like the work. Meeting the people is what I like, too. Just like working at Travis, I loved the interaction with the students,” Flores said. “I’ve really enjoyed it.”
Source-Port Lavaca Wave
Lupe Flores said he has enjoyed his time as a reserve police officer with the Port Lavaca Police Department.
On Friday, Flores celebrated 30 years with PLPD. It was a softball game in the early 1980s that introduced him to the law enforcement field.“It’s really, really funny. I was watching a softball game at the softball field and it was the police department playing against the fire department and I was sitting there watching,” he said. “The chief at that time looked up in the stands. They were missing a shortstop so he said ‘Why don’t you come play shortstop.’”
Flores was not an officer at the time of the game.
“I wasn’t an officer then so I went and played shortstop for him and after the game, he said ‘Okay now, I’ve committed myself and I committed you so you’ve got to get into law enforcement,’” he said. “That’s where it started, kind of crazy. That’s the way it started. I’ve been with this department ever since.”
To become a volunteer officer, Flores went on to attend training.
“It started out, of course, going to school. So I had to go to a school. At that time, they were just 80 hours. You went through it and you became an officer. At that time, they called them reserve officers,” Flores said. “A few years went by and we had a full academy, a police academy. I attended that whenever they had it, myself and 30 or 40 others.”
As a reserve police officer, Flores did work similar to that of a full-time officer.
“We have an eight-hour mandatory time we have to put in a month, but most of us put in more than that. That includes community-type service, working parades, doing fingerprinting for the (Texas) Child Find program, things like that,” he said.
Flores added that the reserve officers have the same authority as a paid officer.
“Well, we man the streets,” he said. “We respond to all types of calls. At one time, we were...doing all the paperwork that was necessary. You went out and you made a DWI stop and we did the paperwork. You responded to a burglary, we did the paperwork.”
Flores and the reserves even had to put in additional work when several members of the department got the ‘Blue Flu,’ he said.
“One time the police department got a bad case of the ‘Blue Flu.’ That’s when the officers in uniform get sick collectively, so the reserves, we manned the streets. We did everything,” he said.
Flores said that one time during the ‘Blue Flu’ one of his fellow reserve officers issued more driving while intoxicated citations than regular officers.
“You’d pull out of the police station, there was somebody acting stupid. It just happened to us. We took care of business. We protected the city. That went on about maybe a week and then people started feeling better,” he said. “Everything that was being contended was being resolved and they came back. We manned the city for a short period of time. We chipped in.”
During the ceremony held Friday, PLPD Chief James Martinez thanked Flores for service to the department and to the city.
“I just want to publicly thank Lupe for his 30 years of service to the community and to the police department and to let you know just how much we appreciate all you’ve done,” Martinez said. “Law enforcement has come a long way and you’ve been a part of it and you’ve contributed a lot and I wanted to thank you very much.”
When Flores was not working with the police department, he worked at Alcoa and eventually retired from there as a superintendent when his wife, Nena, passed away. After retiring from Alcoa, he went on to work as a security officer for Travis Middle School and worked there through last September.
“After that I stayed retired for about a year,” he said. “I got a call from a principal at the schools and they said ‘I’d like for you to come over here and go to work,’ and I did. I was there for six years.”
While there he helped keep the campus safe, he said.
“I was responsible for the security on campus. I responded to every request from the teachers and the staff when we had any kind of problem, dealt with unruly students. I had to take a few to jail. It was not uncommon to give tickets, actual citations,” Flores said.
Although he will no longer work with PLPD, Flores said he still plans to stay busy. In addition to doing work on his new house, he also serves on the board at the Cal-Com Federal Credit Union.
“I don’t feel like I can just hang up my gun and hang up my spurs. I recently purchased a house in town. I have a house at Six Mile, but I purchased one in town and I am remodeling it, so that’s keeping me really, really busy,” he said.
Flores said that his time with the department has been great and added that now is the right time to say good-bye.
“I’m going to miss all of this. I really am, because when you’ve done something for so long, and I actually like the work. Meeting the people is what I like, too. Just like working at Travis, I loved the interaction with the students,” Flores said. “I’ve really enjoyed it.”
Source-Port Lavaca Wave