Officers at the Odessa police department are sporting blue badges.
These blue badges are meant to raise awareness during April, which is Autism Awareness Month.
In fact, the officers even spend around a hundred dollars of their own money to buy those blue badges.
This hits close to home for OPD Sergeant, Brad Cline, who has two autistic grandchildren.
“Autistic children are infamous for liking to explore, get outside and run around. Sometimes they get too far away from home, and they get lost. It’s an especially important time for us to go into action. We bring everybody out to try to find these Autistic children. A lot of them gravitate towards water, like our ponds that we have around here. They can’t swim and they’ll go right into the water, so it’s important that we find them as soon as possible.” – Sergeant Brad Cline
“There are other challenges like if they’re non-verbal and they get lost. They can’t tell people that they’re lost, and we need to get out there and help them. And it’s also important this month to make awareness of the child abuse that can happen to our Autistic Children as well.” – Sergeant Brad Cline
Autism Awareness Month