Youth, police interact in fun, positive program

BANGOR – Mary Parker is raising her 11-year-old grandson and wants to instill in him a sense of responsibility and a respect for the law and for others.

Last week, her grandson, Brandon Vang, whose mother died three years ago and whose father is largely absent from his life, received a booster shot in all these areas as well as some summer fun as part of a police and social service program called Kids ‘N Kops.

“I want him to have a healthy respect for the police,” Parker 49, of Bangor said Friday as the weeklong program was winding down with a barbecue at the Police Athletic League building off Essex Street.

Developed from a police program in Bangor’s sister city of Saint John, New Brunswick, Kids ‘N Kops has been helping to instill self-esteem and promoting an understanding of police work each summer since 2001, Bangor police Detective Cliff Worcester said Friday.

The program operates under the auspices of the Bangor Police Department and Big Brothers Big Sisters of Eastern Maine.

Last week, nine children, ages 8 to 12 and all on the waiting list for a mentor through the Big Brothers Big Sisters program, walked a little bit in the shoes of the police, from covering crime to community service.

“It lets them see us in a different light,” Worcester said about the program that let the children interact with police in a more informal way, including going to the Pirate’s Cove Adventure miniature golf course in Bar Harbor.

The program focuses on children who need some additional positive role models in their lives, organizers said. Some come from single-parent homes or broken families. Others have parents who want to expose their children to positive influences.

In Brandon’s case, his mother died in February 2003 of alcohol and methadone poisoning, Parker said. The boy hasn’t seen his father in three years.

He’s a good kid and considerate of others, his grandmother said. Still, she is worried that without the additional role models Brandon might succumb to bad influences.

That’s where a big brother would come in, said Stacey Coventry, who is working with Big Brothers Big Sisters as part of the AmeriCorps Vista program.

“A friend sometimes can be more influential than a parent can,” she said Friday.

Brandon has been on the Big Brothers list for three years, so Parker welcomed the offer for her grandson to participate in the Kids ‘N Kops program.

This week likely will leave lasting memories and good impressions for the boy, who starts sixth grade at the James F. Doughty School this fall.

During the week, Worcester and Detective Chris Stevens managed to pack in a lot, from tours of police, fire and military facilities to investigations of a mock burglary of a school to actual speeding enforcement. Officers stopped speeders and had the children give the drivers a warning, including one man who was stopped for doing 45 mph in a 25-mph zone.

“So I’m like, ‘OK, slow down next time, and here’s your warning,'” Brandon said.

There was another side that the detectives wanted to get across to the kids – that police work isn’t always about crime and catching bad guys. Police officers have worked hand in hand with charitable agencies, such as the Special Olympics.

On Thursday, the group visited the Elizabeth Levinson Center where they talked and read to children with severe or profound mental retardation. Community service is one of the program’s ideas that Brandon’s grandmother hoped would resonate with the boy.

“It teaches him that you can help other people and that it really feels good doing it,” she said.

Brandon, who drew pictures and read to the other children, agreed.

“I got a really good feeling,” he said.