Resource officer helped change kids’ lives

POST FALLS – When school resumes in the Post Falls School District in the fall, someone will be missing.

Pete Marion, a full-time school resource officer for 16 years, will retire from the Post Falls Police Department at the end of June. It’ll be the end of his 25-year career with the department.

Marion says he has enjoyed his work in the schools.

“You do more positive things than you would do on the street,” he said. “I really felt I was making a difference with some of the kids.”

Marion isn’t the only one who thinks he’s made a difference.

“He will be very missed,” said Becky Ford, school district assistant superintendent. “He’s done an outstanding job.”

Over the years, Marion has heard from some of the former students whose paths he has crossed.

“I’ve heard from kids who have reached adulthood,” he said. “They’ll say, ‘I remember you busted me for drugs, but it was the best thing that ever happened to me.’ “

One teen, who was struggling at home and school, told Marion she wanted to be a police officer, Marion recalled. So he rounded up some local businesses to help send her to a summer program sponsored by the police academy in Boise.

But a few weeks before it started, she began doing drugs and didn’t make the trip.

A year ago, she called Marion and left a voice message.

“She said, ‘I’m so sorry I let you down,’ ” Marion said. She said she had enrolled in the law enforcement program at North Idaho College.

“Those things hit you pretty hard,” Marion said.

As a school resource officer, Marion wears many hats, Ford said. “It goes so far beyond what a police officer does. It’s just wonderful.”

Marion’s roles have included counselor, teacher, prevention officer and, on occasion, investigator.

“A lot of our contacts in the school aren’t criminal,” said Marion’s supervisor, Lt. Greg McLean. “But I know the school has relied on him to mediate some tense moments.”

Marion has had to deal with many child abuse and neglect situations.

He recalls one elementary school boy in particular. His mother was doing drugs, and he lived in a home with no heat and no food.

Marion arranged for shelter for the boy and his younger brother.

Now the boy is living in a safe situation with a family member and is a straight-A student.

“These kinds of stories are great to remember,” Marion said.

McLean has heard similar stories, too.

He got a call one day from a young woman who said that when she was in school, she had a baby. Around Christmastime, Marion gave her a little money to buy a present for her child.

That kind act had a profound effect.

“She said she’d turned herself around,” McLean said. “And she gave thanks to Pete for that.”

McLean says he credits Marion’s personality for making him successful in the schools.

“He’s built quite a rapport with the kids,” McLean said, adding that Marion is easy to get along with and is approachable. “To be able to do that is pretty impressive.”

Ford agrees.

“He looks for ways to help a student grow,” she said. “It’s similar to how an educator works with a child, hoping they’ll learn from their good steps and bad steps.”

For “Officer Pete” – who has been responsible for Post Falls’ KinderCenter, elementary and middle schools and the alternative high school – there have been few downsides to his job.

He has eaten school lunches most days – and jokes that he deserved combat pay for it.

What’s next?

Marion says he’s going to spend July fishing, boating and hanging out with his teenage son.

“It’ll be fun to get up and decide what lake to go to,” he said.

After that? Who knows?

The 56-year-old avid outdoorsman says he doesn’t plan on sitting around. He has applied for work at the new Cabela’s store.

While he’s ready for a new phase of life, he says he’ll miss parts of his old one.

“I think I’ll miss most the connection I have with kids and the staff in the schools,” he said, as well as his colleagues on the police force.

“It’s the people I’m going to miss.”