Dan Woods talks with Dr. Rich Flotron, Director of Public Safety at Southeast Missouri State University. Dr. Flotron, shares about his career in law enforcement and his return to SEMO.
Woods:
This is KRCU’s Going Public. I'm Dan Woods. On today's show, I'm joined by Dr. Richard Flotron, the new Director of Public Safety at Southeast Missouri State University. Flotron most recently served as Deputy Sheriff at the Jefferson County Sheriff's Office and brings over two decades of law enforcement and public safety experience to the campus. He began his tenure at the university on August 1. I spoke with him on the television program Focus on Southeast.
Dr. Flotron, Rich, welcome to the program.
Flotron:
Thank you so much for having me.
Woods:
And welcome to Southeast.
Flotron:
Yes. Thank you.
Woods:
So, tell us about your background, as we get started here.
Flotron:
I graduated from SEMO in 1997, and I was a psychology and criminal justice major way back then. I graduated from here, went to work for Immigration, which used to be INS in Detroit, Michigan, which is now ICE…what they call ICE. That was pre-9/11, so that was before they switched everything over. After that, I went to work for Jefferson County Sheriff's Department and worked there for a number of years. I did everything except work in the jail. I did work narcotics, investigations, worked the road, worked special operations, things like that. I finished my master's degree and wound up going to work for Mineral Area College (MAC), and I was the training coordinator for the Law Enforcement Academy for a number of years. Then I became the Director of Law Enforcement Academy and eventually the DPS director at MAC, as well. I left there after 22 years.
Woods:
Wow. So, where's home?
Flotron:
Home is…I'm from Festus.
Woods:
Okay.
Flotron:
So, I currently live in St Louis before I make the move. Okay, so every day I'm driving down. I try to stay down here a few days a week just to be on campus and close to campus.
Woods:
Okay, so what are some of the short-term and long-term goals that you have for the department? I know it's still sort of early. You’ve been here a month or so.
Flotron:
A month.
Woods:
What are some things that you’re already seeing?
Flotron:
Well, one of the things…my whole plan was to kind of meet everybody and try to meet as many people as I can and find out some of the problems…some of the, you know, not necessarily, I say problems, but some of the issues that need to be addressed. So, I think with that is, you know, just finding the funding is always going to be an issue, right? So, some of the challenges, you know, is, anywhere in the state of Missouri or across the nation, law enforcement has a horrible time trying to recruit and retain police officers. So, that's obviously going to be an issue. One of the caveats to my job, though, is not just am I over the police department, but I also have dispatchers, I also have transit, I also have parking. So that, in of itself, is kind of a challenge, right? Is kind of…learning those two, the dispatch, not the dispatch, but the transit and the parking. Parking is different, right?
Woods:
Yeah.
Flotron:
And I remember, you know…I tell people whenever I was here, I lived actually right behind the studio here on Themis whenever I was here. And so, I walked. I had a perimeter parking pass. I walked every day. That was just kind of what everybody was used to back then. But, you know, the parking lots were much fuller back then.
Woods:
Yeah. How many officers do you have?
Flotron:
So, we have currently…I want to say it's…I think we're scheduled for 15, but whenever you add the command staff in there, we’re at 17 commissioned officers. And then we have four full-time dispatchers and the parking, we have one full-time in parking, and then we have students. So, we have a total of about 28 to 30 employees.
Woods:
Is staffing about where you need it to be? Or do you see it…
Flotron:
I would love to have more, right?
Woods:
Yeah.
Flotron:
Obviously, that's one of those things where you know, again, it's going to be the funding. We are…we have, I think, two vacancies right now in the police department. One of our vacancies, we have a cadet in the Law Enforcement Academy that will graduate in December. We are paying for, or sponsoring, him to go to the Academy. So then…that way, they basically sign a contract with us, saying that we'll pay for your training, and then you give us four years.
Woods:
I was going ask you if there's a tie in with the Law Enforcement Academy. I thought there might be.

Flotron:
Yes, sir. Yeah, that's the…that's the relationship…so, you know, in my in my former place of employment is…in running the Law Enforcement Academy is…you know, I had a relationship with Bobby Bollinger, who's the academy director down here. We tried to collaborate and work as much as possible.
Woods:
What are some challenges and opportunities that you've seen?
Flotron:
So again, the challenges are going to be the recruitment and retention, right? That's the number one thing. You know, the opportunities, I think are…you know, I really want to change some of the things, change the culture. And that’s not to say that there was anything wrong with the culture prior to my arrival. But I really believe, and I want to…my goal is to do more of a what I call student-centric, or customer-centric type of policing. And all that is, you know, is modern style policing, right? Is everybody so used to hearing the term of community policing.
Woods:
Right.
Flotron:
And it's kind of, you know, an offshoot of that. But I just really believe in kind of meeting people where they are, and, you know, helping them solve problems before they become a problem. So being preventative in our thinking. And so, I'm big on building personal relationships. So, I haven't turned down one meeting yet. You know, the opportunity to get to talk to, you know, to your program, or to…you know, I just got…right before I came here, I just accepted a meeting to go talk to the faculty senate. I just want to meet as many people as I can, because I’ve really found in my in my past and, you know, my other employment is the more you get on that personal level with people, and the more that they really get to know you, and I get to know them…people will be more apt to tell you the problems and solutions, right? It's not just about problems, but we want to come up with mutual solutions.
Woods:
Yeah, I guess you know about the shooting that happened at the Show Me Center earlier this year, and the university had a task force put together to do some new security protocols. Can you kind of talk about those and what those are looking like?
Flotron:
Yes, sir. So, we just met with Dr. Vargas this past week and Jeff Price, who's our Emergency Operations Manager. He has kind of been tasked with doing the new security procedures. And so, we have the metal detectors. Our plan is to have metal detectors at every major event, and they're going to be deployed at every sporting event, every play at the River Campus or concert at the Show Me Center. So, with those is…is we have to staff an officer at least at each one of those events.
Woods:
Are they portable? Do they move around or are the stationary.
Flotron:
Yes.
Woods:
Okay.
Flotron:
And we received, I want to say about, a total of eight of them. And they're two standards. So basically, they're about 25 pounds, so they're very portable. So, we can just, you know, kind of throw them in the back of one of our vehicles and transport them. You know, the first time that they used them is the soccer game a couple weeks ago. And everybody's like, “Oh, my gosh, it's going to back up.” You know, the attendees…but it didn’t. It went faster than the people selling tickets, so it was good.
Woods:
So, more to come on that. I want to thank you for your time and for joining us today. And, again, welcome to the university, and I hope we'll talk again soon.
Flotron:
Yes, looking forward to it. Thank you so much.