Thursday afternoon was the grand opening of the David Hill Criminal Justice Center located at 19100 Unity Park in Magnolia. The location is just off Nichols Sawmill Road and across the street from Magnolia Junior High School.
The decision to name the building after David Hill was done last October.
Constable Hill has been in law enforcement almost 44 years. He started his career in August 1967 with the Texas Department of Criminal Justice as a guard at the Ramsey One Unit.
In October 1968 he started with the Texas Department of Public Safety and hit the streets in February 1969.
He actually has two warning tickets that have been given to him by citizens he issued them to in the late sixties. He also displays his old radar unit complete with its needle type dial on display in his office.
David Hill remained with DPS in the Magnolia area until 1982 when he first ran for Constable in a partial term against Wayne Klein who is still with the Montgomery County Sheriff’s Office. At the time if you ran for office you must resign your position with DPS immediately. David won that election as he did against Bill Schaffer in 1984.
Then in 1988 he ended up having to run against two other opponents, Leon Hughes and Tommy Gage. He still remembers winning that election and Tommy Gage walking up to him, shaking his hand and saying,” it’s over, you won, now lets get back to work.” Since then the relationship between the two has been nothing but the best. With Tommy Gage as the Montgomery County Sheriff the two departments work very well together according to Hill.
David Hill went on without having to run against anyone until 1996 when Ron Earnest ran against him. Once again Hill won the race and has not had an opponent since. He plans to run again for the next term as Constable of Precinct 5.
Constable Hill proudly displays his collection of badges from over the years. In addition a photo on his wall has a lot of meaning to him. Hill lost his mother when he was a child. The photo shows four hands. His mothers with the painted finger nails he said and the other three his grandmothers ranging in age from the 80’s to 104.He also has two quilts in his office made with over one hundred police patches from around the world.
The Criminal Justice Center also houses the Tax Office, Montgomery County Sheriff’s Office, Judge Matt Masden’s Court and the Texas Department of Public Safety.
It has been undetermined what will be done with the old offices that all departments out grew on Friendship Drive.
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