HARLINGEN — In times of fear and sorrow, we seek leaders with the experience and capacity to provide hope and security.
Tragedies like Sandy Hook and Uvalde unravel our faith in the systems that sustain us, challenge our sense of truth and reality, and leave us foundering as we seek safety from the madness that has descended upon us.
We seek in those leaders the kind of confidence and strength that can only come with the passage of time, a lifetime challenging adversities that honed critical leadership skills.
Danny Castillo is one such individual who brings a lifetime of experience to the table as the Harlingen school district’s director of emergency management and school safety.
“I served for 25 years as a police officer for the Harlingen Police Department,” said Castillo, 57. “That was from 1986 to 2011. The last nine years I was with the police department I served as police chief.”
Castillo, a former Harlingen city commissioner, has deep roots here and expressed a profound love of the community. Except for a few years as a child living in Houston, he’s been here his whole life.
“Harlingen has been my home,” said Castillo, a 1982 graduate of Harlingen High School.
“This is really where I raised my children. I raised my family. I met my wife here,” he said.
In the midst of his demanding professional life, he strives always to maintain a healthy balance.
“I love spending time with family,” said the father of two grown sons.
“I love fishing with my family,” he said. “We do a lot of outdoors type activities with family and friends. I enjoy relaxing. I enjoy just grilling stuff with family and friends. Just spending time with loved ones.”
He knew at an early age he wanted to pursue a law enforcement career.
“I think that’s what I had wanted to do since I was a little kid,” he said. “I grew up as a child playing cops and robbers, and I always wanted to be a cop. I played that with my brothers and friends, and I believe that was my calling for 25 years.”
However, his dedication to service goes beyond his years as an active-duty police officer.
“I still have a passion for doing what I can to keep our community safe,” he said. “In my capacity here, I’m focused on the school system itself that, on any given day, we have over 19,000 of our community members that are attending our schools not to mention our staff and our teachers. I have a passion for that, and I thoroughly enjoy my job because I can understand the impact that I can have on the quality of life of our students.”
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