Multiple Police Assignments Starting July 1

By Andrew Gorosko

At the start of the new fiscal year on July 1, several police assignments will be changing at the police department.

Officer Steve Ketchum and Officer David Kullgren will be assigned to a newly formed traffic enforcement unit. That squad will focus on enforcing motorists’ traffic violations. The unit’s formation comes in response to continuing public calls for tighter traffic law enforcement. Officer Ketchum is the police department’s motorcyclist. The two men have worked as a provisional traffic enforcement unit recently.

During the past several months, police have stepped up their traffic enforcement, focusing on laws concerning speeding, aggressive driving, and distracted driving.

As an adjunct to the traffic squad, Officer Jeff Silver is the police department’s commercial truck inspector, keying his efforts to finding violations on vehicles operated by businesses.

Also, Officer Gladys Pisani will be serving as the police department’s youth officer. Officer Pisani will be based at Reed Intermediate School. Officer Pisani’s duties in the schools will involve law enforcement matters affecting children ranging from kindergarteners to sixth grade students.

Officer Dana Schubert will become the school resource officer for Newtown High School, handling law enforcement matters involving students in grades 9 through 12.

Officer Domenic Costello, who has been the school resource officer at the high school for the past two years, will return to patrolling local roads.

Also, on August 15, Officer Leonard Penna will become the school resource officer for Newtown Middle School. That school houses students in grades 7 and 8.

Two new police officers are continuing their course of field training, receiving direct guidance from veteran officers while on road patrol. The new officers being field trained are Richard Monckton and David Donahoe.

Also, the police department has two of its new members undergoing law enforcement training at the Connecticut Municipal Police Academy in Meriden. They are William Chapman and Matthew Hayes.

The Police Commission also has hired two new police officers who will be sworn into office next week. They are Aileen Murphy of New Fairfield and Steven Siecienski of Danbury. The new recruits will soon be heading to the police academy to start their training.

With the addition of those two new officers, the police department’s roster will be at 46 members of its full complement of 47 sworn personnel.