JUNEAU – The Alaska House helped strengthen public safety in rural Alaska Thursday when it passed legislation that would update the Village Public Safety Officer (VPSO) program. Senate Bill 81, which passed 34-2, implements seven recommendations that the bipartisan and bicameral VPSO Working Group made in their report, which was adopted on January 24, 2020. […]
(Anchorage) – In a newly created position, a retired Alaska State Trooper returns as VPSO operations director to reimagine the 43-year-old Village Public Safety Officer program. On FirstHand, the podcast, Joel Hard says VPSOs are so critical to public safety in villages, that he could not have done his Trooper job without them. Now […]
Dozens of Alaska Villages Have No Police At All Dozens of Alaska communities still have no police to protect their residents. “Every community deserves public safety. Letting a criminal assault community members, with no protection from any police officer isn’t justice, it’s negligence,” said Mike Williams, Sr. and Les Gara in a joint statement today. “All Alaskans […]
On Thursday evening, Wildlife troopers on Prince of Wales and Village Public Safety Officers on the island did a check on an unoccupied home in Hollis that resulted in the arrest of a Washington man on several charges. VPSOs and Wildlife troopers went to the home at 5:15 pm on Thursday and immediately discovered fresh […]