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Police Department welcomes new officer


The Tea Police Department welcomed a new police officer at the end of May.

Andrew Steinberg, a native of Vernon Center, Minn., interviewed with the Tea Police Department for the school resource officer position.

“That’s always something I was really interested in,” he said. “I went to college for four years in Minnesota and one thing that I did was intern with one of the departments up there. I got to work with the school resource officers there. That’s how I got interested in it.”

Steinberg went to college at Minnesota State University in Mankato.

He moved to Hartford, S.D., about a year ago. He and his wife, Brianna, were married in December. She grew up in the area and wanted to live closer to family so Steinberg got a job with the Sioux Falls Police Department for about six months.

He decided that department wasn’t what he was looking for and wanted something a little more closely knit.

“It wasn’t really that close-knit community that I always had growing up. I started looking elsewhere and saw Tea was looking for an officer and thought it would be a good fit for me,” he said.

While he had been to Tea for Teapot Days a few times in the past, Steinberg was not that familiar with the city. So far he said his experience in the community has been fantastic.

“I really like the community. It reminds me a lot of where I grew up,” he said. “The department is fantastic. The training officers have been amazing. It’s been a great learning experience along the way too.”

This week he has been at school resource officer training in Harrisburg. He is looking forward to the start of the school year.

He is looking forward to getting involved in the community, working events and getting to know everybody. He would like to implement some kid-friendly programming.

“One of my favorite ones that I did in Minnesota was a program called Cops and Bobbers. They take kids out fishing and create a special relationship with kids and teach some life skills,” Steinberg said.


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