For police officer Greg Klinefelter, St. Cloud is in his blood. As a 1987 graduate of Apollo High School and St. Cloud State University graduate, the St. Cloud community is his home.
Klinefelter looks back on Apollo with fond memories.
“Back then, it was the modular system at Apollo, and it felt so different,” says Klinefelter. “It felt like a college campus.”
Klinefelter believes that his high school experience was a good one to transition into college.
“It really helped me be ready for the next step,” he explains.
After completing his degree at St. Cloud State University in mass communications, Klinefelter hit the corporate world. He was in advertising and then became a marketing analyst. However, the corporate world started to take its toll.
The tipping point came in 1996 when his brother, Brian Klinefelter, was killed in the line of duty as a police officer.
His parents owned a small landscaping business at the time. Greg moved home to St. Cloud to help out with the business and eventually purchased the business from them. During this time, his life became very busy and he found himself not having much time to spend with his family.
It was his newly formed family that started calling out to him: the local police force family.
“You don’t realize what a close-knit group police officers and their families are,” says Klinefelter. “We were immediately taken into that family.”
As a way to give back to the police community after his brother’s passing, Klinefelter became a reserve officer.
In 2005, Klinefelter decided he wanted to become a full-time police officer. It took one year to complete his certificate, and at the age of 38 he was hired on as a police officer at the St. Cloud Police Department.
Now, 10 years later, he is a sergeant with a goal to reach lieutenant.
“I love my job. This is why God put me on this earth,” explains Klinefelter.
He knows he’ll still be a police officer five to 10 years down the road, and he loves to train the younger generations.
His advice to those coming up is to not listen to the national media when thinking about law enforcement. He emphasizes that law enforcement is gratifying work.
“You have to have thick skin and truly believe you are in the business to help protect and serve the people,” says Klinefelter. “ You won’t get monetarily rich doing it, but it is incredibly gratifyingly rich.”
Stop and say hello to your local police officers and say, “Thank you.”
And you never know, you may just run into Klinefelter out on patrol.
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