Promotion/Award Ceremony & New Employee Introduction

Tuesday, November 15, 2022

Tuesday night an overflow group of officers, family and friends met with the city council for an exciting Award and Promotion ceremony. The speakers included Chief Virgil Green, Assist. Chief Alice White, and Assist. Chief of Operations Terry Sleavin.

The evening started off with the recognition of our new employees in the front office: Office assistant Nicole Allen, support staff administrator Brittany Froberg and front office assistant Keith Curtis.

This was followed by a Military recognition ceremony for four officers, Tom Buffie- Marines, Danny Pacholke- Navy, Rachel Pickhardt- Army National Guard and Andrew Evenson (CSO) – Marines.

There are three types of honors bestowed on officers that our department recognizes.

Medal of Valor: Extraordinary act of bravery that demonstrated obvious self-sacrifice in the face of death or serious physical injury.

Departmental Commendation: Outstanding police act or single incident, or significant accomplishment or achievement which brings credit to the department and which involved performance above and beyond the performance normally expected and required of the member’s assignment.

Unit Citation: Exceptional performance of their duty/service and which reflects good credit upon the department and law enforcement profession as a whole.

Officer Kyle Toavs was awarded two Medals of Valor for his actions, the first was during a traffic accident when a person’s car rolled down an embankment into a creek, knocking down power lines in the process. He went to the person, tended to his injuries, keeping his head above water with the live wires sparking around them. The second involved the chase and arrest of a suspect involving gun shots being fired at an officer in the Northeast corner of Golden Valley (this is the same incident that Officer Jen Sleavin and Officer Levi Siljander received their Departmental Commendation and Unit Citation for).

We would like to thank the following departments for their help during this shooting: Hennepin County Sheriff’s Office, Crystal PD, St Louis Park PD, Robbinsdale PD, Brooklyn Park PD, Hopkins PD, Minnetonka PD, Plymouth PD, and Minnesota State Patrol Helicopter.

The evening ended with three officers being promoted to Sergeants. Their spouses had the honor of pinning the new Sergeants. They are now known as Sergeant Kyle Toavs, Sergeant Beau Hartneck and Sergeant Danny Pacholke.