CHARLESTON, W.Va. — The Charleston Police Department is looking to expand on what has become one of its more effective enforcement units on the streets of the city. The Hybrid Unit will soon add to its numbers and expand the areas within the city limits where it operates.
“They’re assigned to various parts of town, like mid-town, Five Corners, Elk City, lower west side, and the mall and other downtown areas,” Police Cheif Steve Cooper said. “We’re going to put a new hybrid parol on the west side flats between Park Avenue and Florida Street and we’re going to create a two-man roving hybrid team.”
The roving team will work in areas of the city which presently do not have regular patrols by the hybrid unit. Cooper says the expansion comes because the group has been so effective since it was formed last fall.
“They cover a lot of territory. they’re out of their police cars a lot and they’re able to really focus on problem-solving,” said Cooper. “They’ve made over 500 arrests as a unit just since the fall.”
A lot of the work by the unit has involved transient crime problems in the city. In a nine-hour period, the unit conducted undercover operations at the Town Center Mall and arrested 49 people for a variety of violations. However, Cooper said the unit is also highly visible in the community and normally has the strongest bond with people in the neighborhoods where they work. Several of the members are resource officers in the city’s schools.
“Mostly very veteran police officers,” Cooper explained. “Several of them were police officer of the year in the unit they worked before coming over to the hybrid unit. It’s a very professional group.”
Officers must have three years of experience on the force to join the hybrid unit. There are currently seven full-time members use the school resources officers. Cooper says they are looking to add three more to make the unit number anywhere from seven to 13 at any given time.