I have to chime in on this. I am a campus cop (OMG, one of THOSE guys!) who is not a cowboy and an Auxiliary Officer for my town. The majority of the regular force do not mind working with the Auxiliary when the need may arise. It always seems to be the same old story though. The old timers (and not all, but most) on the force (who yes, have many years on the job, but not as good of modern police training (I know, I know, there is always in service) as cops who have gotten on in the last 10 years or so do) are the ones with the issues. Alot (not all) do such a good job hiding and doing as little as possible, that when they work a night shift as overtime, (which is when we work mostly) they get their panties all in a bunch when they see us. As an Auxiliary Officer, we do the bullshit things that the regulars shouldn't have to be bothered with. School checks, directing traffic at accident scenes,etc. and even medical calls (all our Aux Officers are certified 1st responders, with 2 of us that actually train or recert the regulars when needed).
We unlike Worcester AUX apparently, do not get to use the traffic or better cruiser units. Until we got another designated cruiser as our own as of last week, we got what was left over and barely ran. Sometimes we got cars with lights out, no siren, front ends that were ready to fall apart, transmissions that slipped if driven over 25mph, the list goes on.
As far as taking calls, we'd love to! As of now we respond to all officer in trouble calls and are dispatched if needed as backup in others. We do call dispatch and request regular officers on occasion, but that is only because we are required to, not because we don't know what to do. Alot of times, dispatch will tell us point blank, "I don't call you guys sometimes, because I don't know what kind of calls you can be sent to". We have recently been given a small set of policy and procedures of what, where, when and how we are to respond to calls, to clarify things on a whole. This has just recently happened and should make things easier on all of us Aux, regulars and dispatchers.
Now details, that is a police union issue and hot topic as always. There are so many details in our city. A good amount go to outside agencies or go unfilled. We would be happy to work what is left over, but again, the police union won't let that happen. I can see maybe giving it to an outside agency, since the officer belongs to the same union, but to let it go unfilled is bullshit! We wear the same exact uniform as the regulars and drive the same color schemed car, with the letters A-1 on the roof post, rather than a car number. Some things do not make sense, some do and some things will always remain the same. As the wrestler the rock says, "know your role and shut your mouth", which is basically the Auxiliary creed. If you don't like it, leave! That's my 4 cents on the subject.