A Job Weld Done

Sierra Weld had a different uniform in mind when she graduated from Florida Southern College in 2017.

As fate would have it, the uniform she ended up donning is serving her just fine.

“I had military service in mind, but I always wanted to be a police officer,” said Weld, who became the first female detective in the history of the Steamboat Springs, Colo., police department in January of 2023.

It was a ride-along that was set up by former Florida Southern College adjunct professor Jack Gillen where Weld got her first experience of what it would be like to be a police officer.

“There was a car accident where a motorcyclist who was not obeying traffic laws was hit by an elderly couple in a mini-van,” Weld remembered. “The motorcycle driver died on scene and the elderly couple was rightfully shaken up.”

Gillen, who was the Lakeland Police Department’s Public Information Officer before retiring in 2010, remembers hearing about that ride-along, as he was the one who set up these experiences for his students with on-duty police officers.

“She sat and talked to some of the people caught up in the accident,” Gillen said. “That would’ve been pretty traumatic. I told (my students) it’s not going to be easy.”

Weld is thankful for teachers like Gillen and fellow Florida Southern Criminology professors Dr. Risdon Slate and Dr. Lisa Carter.

Those professors helped Weld get a grasp on what she would eventually face when she was in the field.

“When you are becoming a police officer, or thinking about becoming one, you always wonder how you will act in an emergency situation if you have not been in one before,” Weld said. “Jack Gillen did an amazing job of making sure people who wanted to go into law enforcement did ride-alongs so they could observe the day-to-day of an officer firsthand and make sure they were capable of doing the job. When I did that ride-along, and all the officers who arrived on scene told me I handled the situation as an officer should, I knew I would be okay in this profession. I am immensely thankful for my time at Florida Southern as well as for my amazing professors. I was incredibly lucky to have all three of them for my time in college. I learned so much from those three. They were the biggest part of my college experience.”

Weld’s initial choice upon graduating from FSC with a major in criminology and a minor in psychology involved a camouflage uniform, but after taking some time off and recharging her batteries at her parents’ condo in Steamboat Springs, Weld opted for a blue uniform instead.

An advertisement that the Steamboat Springs Police Department was hiring caught Weld’s eye and that they were paying for potential employees to go through the Glenwood Springs Police Academy.

Weld filled out an application and it did not take long for her to make an impact on her community.

When Weld was a recent academy graduate, she was first on the scene and performed CPR on a male who had a stroke while driving a school bus. Weld performed CPR until fire and rescue workers arrived on scene. She is credited with saving the man’s life.

Weld also saved another life by providing NARCAN, a drug used to help counteract opioid overdoses, to a male patient to keep him alive until fire and rescue units arrived.

For Weld’s service to her community, she was awarded two certificates for saving a life.

The ties Weld has to Steamboat Springs weren’t just started when she started working for the police department.

Weld and her parents went there on vacation every year before she started working here. Weld learned how to ski and became familiar with the city during this time.

Now Weld gets to help the people of Steamboat Springs on a daily basis. It’s the community service she said is the best part of her job.

“If I’m able to, I want to work a case from beginning to end,” she said. “We had a felony sexual assault case, where I worked with the family through the whole process. I was able to help the victim and her family through the next step. It helped light the fire (toward becoming a detective). I really fell in love with it for that aspect. You just try to take the worst thing and try and make it a little better.”