Bulgarian students work as Rehoboth Police officers
Many foreign exchange students come to Rehoboth Beach in the summer for seasonal jobs, finding work in grocery stores, hotels and restaurants. But two Bulgarian students have come to Rehoboth to work as seasonal police officers. They hope to see what really happens, not from a service industry perspective, but from an insider’s point of view.
Dimitar Kosev and Ivan Kasev arrived in Rehoboth Beach May 23, in time for Memorial Day, with lots of curiosity but no experience in police work.
Kosev and Kasev, both 22, are college students at the University of Economics in Varna. They are working as community service officers in Rehoboth, where they have no arrest powers but they do have the ability to communicate in several languages. They said they look forward to helping foreign students who speak Russian, German or most any other Slovak language – meaning most Eastern European students except Romanians, whose language is quite different.
Their jobs also include seasonal duties that most officers have, and they earn the same as other seasonal officers, who started this year at $10.75 an hour.
“Language barriers were hard in the past,” said Rehoboth Beach Police Department Chief Keith Banks, who also said he’s seen an increase in complaints from foreign students here for the summer. Most students are Russian, Ukrainian, or Bulgarian, which all have similar languages, Kosev said.
“We had a hard time with investigations when victims report being taken advantage of,” Banks said. He said the department hopes the visiting officers can help translate between English, Bulgarian and Russian. “We would hear about crimes, but people wouldn’t report them. So we’re hoping more people will come to us now,” Banks said.
Kosev and Kasev are the first officers in what Banks said could be an annual program to smooth out difficulties between police and students.
“They’re working out well,” he said. For the first few weeks the officers learned the radio system, became acquainted with regulations and got to know the department. They are regularly scheduled to patrol the Boardwalk and are called into the station for when translation is needed. For their part, the new officers say they are enjoying their work.
“It’s thrilling when I hear someone call on the radio for a fight or theft,” Kasev said. The officers are helping others and also learning. “I heard a lot about America and I wanted to learn more about the culture and improve my English,” Kosev said.
Both students applied for visas to work in the United States through an agency, the Council on International Education Exchange. Rehoboth police worked through the same agency, looking for candidates.
