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Photo by Reed Hutchinson
UCLA Photographic Services
Officer Debbie Mills says she enjoys her work because “there’s
always something different happening every day.”
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2002 officer of the year
She patrols the UCLA beat
by wendy soderburg
ucla today staff
No one was more surprised than Debbie Mills to hear that she had been
named the UCLA Police Department’s Officer of the Year for 2002.
Last spring, Mills, who is lead officer for the UCLA Medical Center
and Medical Plaza, was at a training class with her fellow officers when
Chief Clarence Chapman called her name. “I must have had this look
of shock on my face because the chief looked at me and said, ‘Yes,
you’re the one. You are Debbie Mills, and you are Officer of the
Year.’ Everyone commented on how shocked and surprised I was.”
The award is given yearly to an officer who has shown a long-term commitment
to the UCLA community, often going “above and beyond” what
he or she is asked to do. “That encapsulates what Debbie Mills has
done,” said Sgt. Jim Vandenberg, one of Mills’ supervisors.
“She’s a self-starter, a self-initiator. She extols the concepts
of community-oriented policing here at UCLA.”
Mills said: “It just caught me off-guard. I don’t think
I did anything above and beyond what anybody else has done.”
But the people with whom Mills interacts every day would disagree. When
she walks her beat through the medical center and medical plaza, people
wave and greet her with a smile. She responds in kind.
“I like the fact that the people in this community feel that they
have their own police officer,” Mills said. “People are comfortable
enough to come up to me and say, ‘Hey, I have a problem: Is there
anything you can do?’ And it makes you feel good that they have
that much confidence in you, that much respect, that they can come over
and ask for help.”
A native of West Virginia, Mills attended the West Virginia State Police
Academy and worked for the Weirton Police Department for three years.
In 1984, she came to California and worked as a security guard at the
MGM studios in Culver City, where her supervisor encouraged her to get
back into police work. Three years later, Mills was hired at UCLA, where
she has served as a detective and field training officer.
Despite the lower crime rate at the university, UCLA’s police
officers still find themselves in dangerous situations. Mills was awarded
a Medal of Valor from the UCPD Council of Chiefs in 1988 when she and
Officer Wayne King risked their lives to rescue a fellow officer from
a burning sorority house on Hilgard Avenue.
“Police work is police work anywhere in the state, but what I
like about the university is the setting itself,” Mills said. “It’s
a diverse community. Not just the cultures, but the people — from
professors to students, doctors to administrative assistants. It’s
a city within a city.”
The people, Mills added, make it worthwhile. “Especially since
9/11, people have come up to me and said, ‘Thank you. Thank you
for doing the job you do.’ And it feels really good.”
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