Meet Your Neighbor: Fremont Police Bike Patrol hits the streets

FREMONT — It didn’t take long for kids playing at Rodger Young Park to swarm the four Fremont Police Bike Patrol officers who had gathered at the shelter house.

Shortly after they arrived, a young man approached to ask if they had a spare inner tube for his bike, and several children ran up just to get a look at the police officers wearing blue shirts and bike helmets. They left with their hands loaded with small gifts the officers keep in their bike bags — stickers, pencils and coupons for free treats at local restaurants.

The bike patrol is a bit of an anomaly in Fremont.

“They’re not used to seeing officers on bikes, wearing different uniforms,” said Sgt. Jacob Scully.

Bike patrol officers spend part of on-duty time patrolling city streets

Scully and the other bike patrol members — Officer Andrew Dix, Officer Jared Cashen and Officer Wayde Huddleston — spend part of their on-duty time each week patrolling the streets of Fremont. Each officer also handles typical police work in a cruiser or at a desk, but bike patrol widens accessibility in the community.

The bike patrol officers can do pretty much anything they can do in a cruiser: respond to criminal calls, serve arrest warrants and monitor traffic. A bike is less conspicuous than a cruiser when an officer is scanning drivers with radar. A bike officer can catch a speeding motorist and summon a cruiser for a traffic stop.

Conversely, a bike makes an officer more visible in the community, creating opportunities for connection between the police and local residents.

“We’re more approachable,” Dix said. “People are more likely to stop and talk.”

Bikes allow officers to access places that are difficult for a cruisier to maneuver, such as the bike trail, parks, the downtown business district and crowded events such as car shows.

“We handle a lot of calls and can get there quicker,” Huddleston said. “On the Fourth of July, we’ll be able to maneuver through the traffic.”

Officers will ride their bikes to local schools

During the school year, the officers occasionally ride their bikes to local elementary schools during recess, and they’ll stop by the middle and high schools as students arrive on buses.

“It lets the kids know we’re there. The kids like it,” Dix said.

The bike patrol was revived by Huddleston and Cashen in 2019 after a more than 15-year absence.

“Back in the day, there was a bike patrol, but the officers retired and it died out,” Huddleston said. “In 2019, Jared and I went through training to restart it.”

All four of the bike patrol officers are certified through the International Police Mountain Bike Association, where they learned to do police work on two wheels.

“We did all kinds of stuff in the training. We learned mounting and dismounting, shooting from a bike and riding on stairs,” Huddleston said.

Just as a foot chase can take an officer on rough terrain, so can a bike chase. The officers trained to ride in a variety of conditions.

“Anything you can walk on, we rode on,” Dix said.

The community has embraced the Fremont Police Bike Patrol. Businesses appreciate the extra security, schools enjoy the benefit of added police connection and kids are thrilled to find officers on bikes in the park.

“The bike patrol was gone for at least 15 years,” Scully said. “When we started it again, people loved seeing us back out there.”

Contact correspondent Sheri Trusty at  sheritrusty4@gmail.com.

This article originally appeared on Fremont News-Messenger: Meet Your Neighbor: Fremont Bike Patrol