Officers from several Cowley County law enforcement agencies will spend stints in Greensburg beginning this weekend to help provide security for the tornado-ravaged town in western Kansas.
Personnel and equipment from police departments in Arkansas City, Winfield and Udall and the Cowley County Sheriff’s Department will be involved in the effort, said Brett Stone, Winfield’s assistant chief of police. The Winfield police department is coordinating the effort.
Stone stressed the plans are preliminary and could change if necessary. Four officers and a dispatcher from Winfield are to make up the first group departing Friday evening.
“We’re offering a dispatcher but we don’t know yet if they still need a dispatcher,” said Stone, who is among a group scheduled to stay in Greensburg through Monday. “The information we have keeps changing in situations like this.”
Stone said teams of officers will travel to the town at different times depending on when they are needed.
The plan being developed locally calls for at least four officers and two patrol cars to be in Greensburg at any time for at least the next seven to 10 days. Winfield will go first because a Friday through Monday schedule coincides with days off for the officers who volunteered.
If any Kansas town can town can relate to Greensburg’s grim situation, it’s Udall. A tornado nearly wiped the Cowley County town off the map in May 1955.
“I feel it’s important to have one of our officers and one of our cars there because when Udall needed help we got it,” said Matt Dennis, Udall’s police chief. “That community is going though what we went through.”
Winfield’s chief Jerry DeVore and assistant city manager Gary Mangus were in Greensburg Thursday for a briefing. The state put out a call across Kansas for officers to secure the small town and enforce curfews.
Calls for aid are common in disaster situations. Officers and employees with various city and county agencies have been called on to offer expertise in the past. Officers from Sumner and Butler counties are also expected to participate this time around, Stone said.
A briefing with coordinators from Winfield is scheduled for Friday morning. Dennis said hoped he would learn more about what was expected of his officers at that time.
Udall is sending two of its officers to help in Greensburg, according to Dennis. Sgt. Perry Lambert will be going and taking one of the department’s patrol cars with him. As of Thursday afternoon it was undecided which reserve officer would join him.
Udall department plans to send Lambert prepared. They are packing his patrol car with three spare tires, as well as cases of water and food, Dennis said. Stone, Winfield’s assistant chief, said local businesses have been quick to donate supplies and provide use of a van for transporting officers.
Stone said officers who go to the scene can learn while they’re working.
“We want as many people involved as possible,” he says. “There will be other disasters where we can apply what we learn. Or something could happen here.”
