Speak Out

Masking up
Is everyone in Christian County proud that we all have been asked to wear masks again in indoor settings? What exactly are people proving by this? It seems to be that they do not care about their own health; the wellbeing of anyone else (including children and vulnerable members of their own fam- ily); or grabbing the chance to return to a life somewhere near normal enough to be pleasant again. And if it’s being done in Trump’s name, why? Didn’t he get the vaccination effort going? I guess survival of the fittest (read smartest) is really a thing.

Great idea

Please do not dump Speak Out! Sure, it can be hateful, spiteful, stupid, ignorant but also funny, insightful, entertaining, informative. I enjoy when the Speak Out sets up the Kool-Aid drinking Dems or Repubs with some political crap that gets an immediate retort. Also, every now and then, someone comes up with a GREAT idea, like me now, Get the damn shot! For others, so we can get back some normalcy…

Tolerance

Tolerance will reach such a level that intelligent people will be banned from thinking so as not to offend the imbeciles. Fydor Dostoievski, author of Crime and punishment. Kind of an appropriate
title nowadays.

Policing questions
Some issues have come to my attention along with my fellow colleagues retired and active from the State Level and Local. I am very concerned with officers staying safe. In this climate law enforcement is under attack. We are lucky in Christian County that we care about police the majority. I read a post from a Mr. Mathon who is running for Sheriff. I wanted to ask around to see if his statements are true. I care about this county and been a resident here over 40 years. I found out that the sheriffs office could not be part of the fair for citizens protection, they had to hire a security firm. I also found out that we have one deputy sheriff patrolling most of the time. I also read his post and asked a member of the Taylorville Police that I have known my whole 25 year career that the Sheriffs Office does not want to participate in the special operations team. He did not know the reason. The last is K9 cannot believe this county does not have one. The county is supposed to be the top law enforcement agency what is going on? What about this weekend dirt riders with all these out of town people is County going to help, I do not think so. Very disappointed and so our my colleagues from the State. I wonder if the Sheriff’s department is relying on the State to help them. Being a State guy I don’t think so they have enough to do but help out only in extreme emergencies. We need to find out what is going on. I have a police department that I can count on what about all these other towns. I have family members that rely on county resources where are they.

(Christian County Sheriff Bruce Kettelkamp responds: “The Christian County Sheriff’s Office was a part of the 2021 Christian County Fair for security purposes. We had at least two deputies (usually more) assigned to the fairgrounds during this year’s fair. This is in addition to the regularly scheduled deputies who were also available to respond to the fair if needed. The difference this year with security staffing at the fair is this, IL House Bill 3653 which became PA 101- 0652, also known as the police reform bill. In years past, our Reserve Deputies would provide security at the fair. With this new bill, each Reserve Deputy now would be required to have the same training as a full- time deputy. Now you are asking a Reserve Deputy who normally has another full-time job, to put in countless hours of training and be exposed to the potential increased liability set forth in this bill, when this is done on an unpaid, voluntary basis.

The sheriff’s office does not regularly run one deputy for patrol. The staffing level may be at one deputy for a non-holiday, weekday dayshift from time to time, however, dur- ing these times we normally have the Sheriff, Chief Deputy, and 2 investigators on duty who can all assist if necessary. Second and Third Shifts will always have at least two deputies on at all times.

The Sheriff’s Office has always offered our resources to the smaller agencies within the county. When the need for special operations arises, we have always used the Illinois State Police Swat Team. Another special operations resource for our area is ILEAS. When evaluating joining the special operations team, the sheriff’s office considered the availability of two established special operation teams, staffing, liability, number of times utilized and cost. These factors lead to the decision not to join at this time. As stated previously, the sheriff’s office resource are always available to other smaller agencies.

The sheriff’s office has a K-9 program established. We are between active K-9 handlers, but recently appointed Deputy Andy Voorhees as the new K-9 handler for Christian County. Deputy Voorhees will start his K-9 certification in the next available MCLETC class.

Many of the small towns in Christian County have their own police depart- ments. The sheriff’s office responds to calls in those jurisdictions as it always has, when those depart- ments are unavailable.”

It’s a shame
To such good shape: You need to get your facts straight before writing about President Trump. Yes, the country was in good shape for the 1st three years of President Trump’s Presidency. People had jobs again and the economy was doing good. Also, there was no hacking while he was president! The violence at the Capitol was not fault of his. He told the crowd to march in front of the Capitol and that was all. So don’t blame him for something he didn’t do. DUring his last year in office, COVID hit this country. This was no fault of his, so stop blaming him for the death of 350,000 people dying. You dimwit Democrats want to blame PResident Trump for everything. It’s a shame.

Good shape
I agree with Good Shape. I will saw that I agree with the person who wrote in Good Shape 100%. Our world is in better now than before. It is hard job to keep America run smooth all the time and I praise the person that do it right now. Try taking place of Person that run USA. See how big job is then every- one think.

Freedom writing
Please don’t cancelled Speak Out cause like taking one of our freedom away from us. So think about it, would you like your freedom writing and talking take away from you. Think about it cause something more valuable than anything else.