{"id":73644,"date":"2016-08-23T17:58:06","date_gmt":"2016-08-23T23:58:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/mancos-marshal-works-to-put-department-back-on-track\/"},"modified":"2016-08-23T23:58:06","modified_gmt":"2016-08-23T23:58:06","slug":"mancos-marshal-works-to-put-department-back-on-track","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/mancos-marshal-works-to-put-department-back-on-track\/","title":{"rendered":"Mancos marshal works to put department back on track"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"Mancos
Mancos Marshal Jason Spruell stands with one of the new vehicles the department recently acquired, a 2016 Ford F150.<\/span>Jacob Klopfenstein\/The Journal<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

When Jason Spruell was appointed in April as Mancos marshal, he had several goals in mind for the department. After the first few months on the job, he said he\u2019s making progress.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m trying to learn the way Mancos handles stuff and all the extra duties the marshal has,\u201d Spruell said. \u201cThat\u2019s been the biggest thing to learn.\u201d<\/p>\n

Spruell had served as acting marshal since December, after John Cox resigned. The Mancos Town Board appointed Spruell to the position in April after he and several other candidates went through a rigorous application process that included a thorough background check, polygraph test and psychological assessment. The assessment process had been intensified after Cox was accused and later sentenced to six months of probation of falsifying a citation to a woman for driving 45 mph in a 25 mph zone.<\/p>\n

Spruell said the process was very challenging.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was a long process, and it was somewhat overwhelming, but it was a very good process, and it helps you get good candidates,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Spruell began by attempting to rebuild trust in the Marshal\u2019s Office, which is going out into the community, doing more business checks and patrols on foot, he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re trying to be out on foot more and talking to the public more,\u201d he said. \u201cWe\u2019ve gained the trust of the public.\u201d<\/p>\n

The department has doubled the amount of business checks, Spruell said.<\/p>\n

The office has increased training, making sure that staff have the required number of hours for their post, Spruell said, and know how to deal with people who have a mental illness.<\/p>\n

Continuing with that professional development is important for the community, Spruell said.<\/p>\n

\u201cI want deputies to be trained to help the community and to help themselves, or they won\u2019t know how to deal with a certain situation,\u201d Spruell said. \u201cThat\u2019s what we\u2019re here for \u2014 to help the community, so we need to train on how to do that.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Marshal\u2019s Office also has become involved once again with the regional Child Protection and Multi-disciplinary teams. The Child Protection Team is a group of law enforcement, citizens, social services and day care centers that come together to discuss various child welfare cases. The Multi-disciplinary Team is a group of regional law enforcement agencies that work collaboratively to solve crimes.<\/p>\n

Spruell said he also is looking to start more drug education in Mancos schools, not only to raise awareness for students about their effects, but also to train teachers on how to recognize the signs of students who are adversely affected by drugs.<\/p>\n

Now, the Marshal\u2019s Office will focus on public education, Spruell said. Earlier this summer, some cars were getting broken into around town, so Spruell put the word out that people should start locking their cars at night. The department eventually got some tips from the public and arrested the suspects, Spruell said.<\/p>\n

He\u2019s hoping for more collaborations with the public.<\/p>\n

\u201cTo me that speaks volumes that your community is working with law enforcement,\u201d Spruell said. \u201cMancos is a great community that looks out for each other.\u201d<\/p>\n

People should know they need to call Cortez Police Dispatch instead of the marshal or one of his deputies, Spruell said.<\/p>\n

Spruell is still working to hire a third deputy, which would bring his staff to four officers. Shawnee Watenpaugh recently joined the department after working for the Cortez Police Department.<\/p>\n

The marshal also is working to address the issue of school security at Mancos schools. Having a school resource officer would be a great thing, but it comes down to funding, Spruell said.<\/p>\n

Spruell is happy to be a part of the community in Mancos.<\/p>\n

\u201cI love it here,\u201d he said. \u201cThe community is great, and the staff is great. It\u2019s a wonderful place to work. I enjoy going out and talking to the community. It\u2019s nice being in a small town because you get to know people, and it\u2019s really nice to just go out there and chat with people. They\u2019ll tell you what\u2019s going on and what to watch for. It makes it nice.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

a turbulent 2015, Mancos Marshal Jason Spruell is putting the department back on track<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":73645,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[52,83,60],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-73644","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-law-enforcement","tag-mancos","tag-montezuma-county"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73644","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=73644"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73644\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/73645"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=73644"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=73644"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=73644"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=73644"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}