Saturday is National Law Enforcement Appreciation Day, a citizen-led moment of recognition for law enforcement professionals.

Stuart Police Chief Dave Reha says he appreciates the majority of the community understanding that they’re a group of people doing a job and they’re ultimately there to help the public.

“Luckily here in Stuart, and not necessarily just Stuart, it says a lot about our state and the people that live in this region. We don’t see a whole lot of the disrespect. Obviously in our line of work, we’re always going to make people unhappy. We understand that. We’re not going to be everybody’s best friend. It’s hard to be friends with someone who arrested you, gave you a speeding ticket. We get more thanks, more appreciation than we do people openly disrespecting or being vocal about disrespect of law enforcement.”

Additionally, Reha is hoping that 2021 will give the department the opportunity to continue education classes for identity theft, property protection and the National Night Out event that was postponed in 2020.