Featured in our Officer Spotlight this month, we would like to introduce you to Ofc. Yale Partlow.

He is the UMBPD homeless outreach liaison and a member of the department’s Crisis Intervention Team. Ofc. Partlow began his law enforcement career with the UMBPD in 2012 and worked in patrol for roughly six years before being reassigned to the department's Community Outreach and Support Team (C.O.A.S.T.) at the beginning of 2019. His current role as an outreach officer primarily entails serving as a bridge between unsheltered/at-risk persons within their jurisdiction and local service providers.

Q&A with Ofc. Yale Partlow

1. What is the most rewarding aspect of your career?
   
   • Really seeing the positive effects of my efforts on people’s lives.
2. What made you decide to go into law enforcement?
   • An instinctive impulse to serve and protect others.
3. What is your greatest achievement on the job?
   • Being selected to serve as the UMB Police Department’s outreach liaison, a role that is in complete accord with my sociopolitical views and my particular orientation to law enforcement.
4. What is your greatest achievement outside of the job?
   • My daughter.

1. What is your most memorable event from your job as a police officer?
   The day I realized that it’s OK to be afraid in the line of duty, but that the real task is to navigate through that fear and self-doubt amid the chaos to get the job done.
2. What makes for a great day on the job?
   Successfully bridging at-risk persons to service providers and later seeing their lives transformed for the better.
3. Knowing your job can get stressful, how do you maintain your sanity?
   Spending time with my wife and daughter, creative writing, and watching soccer.
4. What would you say to someone to encourage them to go into law enforcement?
   Knowing what I know now, I’m not so sure that I would encourage anyone to do this, unless, of course, I really felt that they were truly built for it and would make an excellent officer.
5. Have you had any mentors in your career? If so, how have they helped?
   I have! They have each influenced me in different ways, but they all have taught me the value of maintaining composure and situational awareness when all hell breaks loose. It has been an invaluable lesson throughout my career.
6. Where do you see yourself in five to 10 years?
   Commanding the most innovative and successful police-led outreach unit in the country.