Belleville police officers Rob Rust (left front) and Sean Harris (right front) were both recently promoted to the rank of lieutenant. | Welcome to Belleville, IL/Facebook
Belleville police officers Rob Rust (left front) and Sean Harris (right front) were both recently promoted to the rank of lieutenant. | Welcome to Belleville, IL/Facebook
The City of Belleville recently made a few changes to their police and fire departments.
Among those changes were promoting Master Sergeant Rob Rust and Master Sergeant Sean Harris to the rank of lieutenant. Harris has been in charge of the fleet, overseeing all the patrol officers, vehicles and training; while Rust has been in the department for almost 25 years, serving as patrol, detective and traffic unit supervisor.
“[Rust] reviews all the accident reports and supervised that unit for many years and has done a stellar job his whole career,” Police Chief Matthew Eiskant said in a Dec. 19 City Council meeting. “We've kind of grown up in the department together and it's always been a pleasure working with him.”
In addition to the promotions, the council voted to accept and hire probationary Police Officers Luis Molina and Andrew Harmon to join their ranks within the department on Jan. 2. Probationary firefighter Nathaniel Syrcle was also approved to join the Fire Department in February of 2023.
Other changes included voting to increase the number of officers within the Police Department from 72 to 74 and accepting a $35,000 COPS grant for de-escalation, which they were able to spend on software and hardware from Street Smarts VR for a new contract.
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