By John Baetz
Lincoln County Sheriff’s Deputy, Clint Bailey, was one of 44 new law enforcement officers congratulated by Eric K. Jackson, the special agent in charge of the FBI’s Kansas City Field Office, during their graduation from the Kansas Law Enforcement Training Center (KLETC) on October 23.
The new officers were members of the 236th basic training class at the center.
Bailey is a 2010 graduate of Sylvan Unified High School and a graduate of Pratt Community College. In 2012 Bailey moved to Lincoln and began working for the Lincoln County Sheriff’s Department as a dispatcher, and later moved into a role as a jailer with the department in 2014.
Bailey obtained his part-time officer certification from the KLETC in 2014 before completing his full-time officer certification in October, and beginning his official duties as a full-time officer with the LCSD at the end of last month.
“I’m incredibly proud of how hard Clint has worked to get to this point of his career,” Undersheriff Dustin Florence said. “He will be a tremendous asset to the department.”
Located one mile west and one mile south of Yoder, near Hutchinson, the center is a division of University of Kansas Continuing Education.
The 44 graduates, who began their training July 20, 2015, represented 36 municipal, county and state law enforcement agencies from across Kansas.
Graduates receive certificates of course completion from KLETC and Kansas law enforcement certification from the Kansas Commission on Peace Officers’ Standards and Training, the state’s law enforcement licensing authority. The training course fulfills the state requirement for law enforcement training.
Classroom lectures and hands-on applications help train officers to solve the increasingly complex problems they face in the line of duty, a press release from the University of Kansas’ Office of Public Affairs said.
Established by the Kansas Legislature in 1968, the center trains the majority of municipal, county and state law enforcement officers in Kansas and oversees the training of the remaining officers at seven authorized and certified academy programs operated by local law enforcement agencies and the Kansas Highway Patrol.
About 300 officers enroll annually in the 14-week basic training program. The center offered continuing education and specialized training to as many as 5,600 Kansas officers each year.
Funding for the training center is generated from court docket fees from municipal and state courts.
