Community Oriented Policing Bureau

Major Jose Vargas

The Community Oriented Policing Bureau’s (COPB) primary function is road patrol, which is under the leadership of Major Jose Vargas. COPB provides quality law enforcement services including responding to emergency calls. The bureau is committed to preventing and reducing crime through a variety of proactive problem-solving initiatives. Within the bureau, there are specialized units and divisions such as: Community Resource Unit, Community Service Aides, Canine (K-9), Field Training Program, Field Force and Honor Guard.

COMMUNITY RESOURCE UNIT

The Community Resource Unit is managed by one sergeant and is comprised of eight community resource officers. The unit is responsible for responding to community needs, evaluating the effectiveness of community programs, crime prevention activities, community concerns, community activities, meetings, presentations and attending special events. This unit is tireless in their efforts to be innovative and dedicated to our community. During 2020, the Community Resource Unit hosted or participated in many programs designed to build bridges into the community. Although the pandemic created challenges throughout the year, the Community Resource Unit continued their efforts by enhancing community relations through special events. It should be noted that CDC guidelines were followed during every event.

COMMUNITY SERVICE AIDES

The community service aides provided an invaluable level of support to the sworn members of the Miramar Police Department. This unit is comprised of 16 community service aides. The unit responds to traffic complaints and offers assistance, as requested, by officers and immediate supervisors. They write offense and property reports as reported by citizens, and they provide court testimony when needed. The community service aides also provide service to the Records Unit where they provide weekly delivery of correspondence to and from the South Satellite Courthouse and Broward County’s Main Courthouse. Csommunity service aides are assigned to Miramar Police Department’s front desk and Town Center’s front lobby/information desk. The unit also supports other units by providing coverage to communications personnel and serving as the primary investigators on traffic crashes. They provide traffic control whenever possible and enforce parking regulations. Additionally, the community service aides also volunteered at various community events throughout the city. These individuals in the unit accumulated some truly impressive statistics. Throughout the course of the year, the unit responded to 4,979 calls for service, issued 1,218 traffic citations, completed 1,943 offense incident reports, handled 1,530 crash reports and processed countless crime scenes.

FIELD TRAINING PROGRAM

The Miramar Police Department, in keeping with community expectations for professional police services, has an established Field Training Officer program. The purpose of the Miramar Police Department Field Training Officer program is to prepare officers and community service aides in training to perform essential duties and to enhance the professionalism of the patrol division through continuous quality improvement. In 2020, the department was honored to train a total of 11 officers, all of whom successfully completed the Field Training Program.

CANINE (K-9) UNIT

The K-9 unit is a specialized group of law enforcement officers who train dogs to perform the responsibilities of a police officer. In addition to their usual duties, each K-9 officer trains their K-9 partner in narcotic or explosive detection and apprehension. Some of the unit’s accomplishments in 2019 are as follows: • Developed a focused and accountable training methodology that exceeds industry and FDLE training requirements. • Replaced and renewed necessary training materials. • Four K-9s completed their annual FDLE/MPD evaluation requirements. • K-9 teams completed their annual explosive detection recertification. • Hosted explosive detection training for neighboring K-9 units. • The unit conducted two joint training sessions with Miramar SWAT.

The unit also had the opportunity to provide the following K-9 demonstrations as a public service:

• Conducted daily business checks throughout the city • Provided narcotics detection to the joint DUI checkpoint • Conducted 27 K-9 searches resulting in 13 apprehensions • Provided explosive detection assistance to special events such as the

Homestead NASCAR race and Fort Lauderdale Boat Show • Due to Covid restrictions no public demos were conducted