Officer recognized for youth rapport

By Bill Donovan
Staff Writer

Gallup police officer Jeff Barnhurst was recently recognized by the Gallup McKinley School Board as going above the call of duty for his work with students in the school district. Barnhurst has been with the Gallup Police department for eight years, and says he loves his job and plans on staying with the department until he retires. [Photo by Jeff Jones/Independent]

GALLUP — For Jeff Barnhurst, being a Gallup police officer isn't about car chases and arresting drunk drivers.

It's more about listening and being there for kids who go to Gallup schools.

And that's why this week, the Gallup-McKinley Public School Board gave him a certificate of appreciation for the work he has been doing as one of the school resource officers.

"He really has gone over and above what has been required of him," said School Superintendent Karen White, who added that Barnhurst has established a great rapport with the students at many of the Gallup schools.

"He's really good with kids one on one," she said.

An eight-year veteran with the police force, Barnhurst said he loves the job and the chance to work with the counselors at the schools to help students who may be getting it trouble because of personal problems or making the wrong kinds of friends.

As part of the school's DARE program, Barnhurst also counsels kids about the dangers of drugs.

"A lot of the kids are in a single parent household," he said. By being there and at times just listening to their problems, many of the students who are growing up without a father look upon him as a mentor, someone who can stand in for the father they don't have.

He doesn't mind because he sees his job as one of not arresting students, but rather helping them make sense of their lives and hopefully keeping them from getting into trouble.

He said he remembers a recent incident in which he took a 15-year-old student to the Indian Health Service hospital where he was treated for almost four hours.

Although his parents were told he was at the hospital, no one in the family came to see him. But Barnhurst was there.

That's his job nowadays to be there in case any of the schools in the area need his services.

Sure, he said, there are some in the higher grades who look upon any police officer as the enemy but time after time, he has shown the students at the junior high and the high school that he cares about them, and over the years, they have begun to respond.

In the summer, when school is out, he's usually assigned to patrolling the downtown area, and even that has its own sense of rhythm.

Instead of watching out for troubled youth, he finds himself looking for people who may have had to much to drink and giving directions to tourists who may want to find the easiest way back to the interstate or directions to get to Chaco Canyon.

But it's the work in the schools that he says he loves the best, and each summer, unlike the students who are on break, he probably counts the days when school is back in session and he can get back to what is becoming his life's work helping students cope with life.