YSU police earn state certification

The Youngstown State University Police Department has been certified by the Ohio Collaborative Community-Police Advisory Board for meeting standards on the use of force and recruitment and hiring.

“This certification reflects our commitment to ensuring that our department is fully prepared when it comes to situations that require the use of force and when it comes to having in place appropriate policies and practices for recruiting, hiring and screening candidates for positions in the department,” said Shawn Varso, police chief.

The YSU Police Department has 24 full-time commissioned officers, as well as 69 active, part-time commissioned officers, eight full- and part-time dispatchers and 18 student employees.

Gov. John R. Kasich established the Ohio Task Force on Community-Police Relations in 2014 in response to a series of incidents in Ohio and across the nation involving police and their communities. The next year, the governor established the Ohio Collaborative Community-Police Advisory Board to, among other things, develop minimum standards for all law enforcement agencies for the use of force – including deadly force – and recruitment/hiring procedures for new officers.

More than 500 agencies employing over 27,000 officers (in all 88 counties, representing 80 percent of all law enforcement officers in Ohio and most of Ohio’s metropolitan departments) are either certified or in the process of becoming certified.   

The standards are the first of their kind in Ohio.

The state has partnered with the Buckeye State Sheriffs’ Association and the Ohio Association of Chiefs of Police to help certify Ohio’s nearly 960 law enforcement agencies on a process to ensure that they are in compliance with the new standards.

For more information, visit https://www.ocjs.ohio.gov/ohiocollaborative/.