Good For Government Work

I guess it's a thing not to think much of "government workers".  We're wasting your tax dollars and stuff.  And I use "and stuff" here purposefully, not because I don't have the vocabulary to further explain all of the lame notions people have about the effort, pay and ability of government workers, but because I don't think better descriptors are worth wasting time on.  Especially after Friday.  Friday my partner and I, both government employees, happened to be off at home together when a really bad man started off a series of events that began and ended with the slaughter of a deputy sheriff. Two total. Also government employees. I say slaughter because that's what it was.  From their wounds it is clear, at least to me that: 1. He figured they'd be wearing vests.  2. He shot around that fact to escape being in trouble for whatever he was doing in the Motel 6 parking lot with a gun that looks to me like it should only be used in combat missions against robot-super-warriors.  But that's not my point.

My partner and I aren't usually the type to watch news coverage of police chases, but for whatever reason we were captivated by this.  I think probably because it was so close to home on so many levels.  I watched her watching the coverage with the massive man-hunt, choppers in the air; the multi-agency response.  I watched her wince when they confirmed the first deputy had been killed.  Then the second. I tried to imagine what it must have been like for the dispatcher somewhere in Sacramento to have received the call from the surviving deputy that shots had been fired; that an officer was down and that the suspects had fled. I tried to imagine what it must have been like for the surviving deputy to watch his partner and friend be shot in the forehead, recoiling back to die in a pool of blood in the parking lot of a Motel 6.  To feel what he must have felt all at once; the instinct to return fire and pursue, conflicting with the instinct to save his partner and get help, coupled with at least a touch of fear for his own life.  I watched as probation officers showed up at the various scenes to lend a hand during the search.  Watched the SWAT teams show up.  Watched the ambulance at the end, load up the suspect to transport him to the hospital for medical clearance.

We know these people.  Not these specific individuals mind you, but this cast of characters in the county where we work.  We know they have wives and children and finances and dogs at home.  We know the arresting officers, the SWAT guy. My parents were the teachers who kept all of those kids safe in classrooms across two counties where schools were on lock-down. I live with the dispatcher, often work with the EMT's. I have spent time and laughed with the DA's who will be assigned this case and I've had lunch with the PD who will be assigned to uphold the rights of the defendant.  I AM the mental health worker that will be asked to visit the alleged assailant in jail. Or I have been. I am not in this case by a county.  One county. I think maybe that is why we watched so closely yesterday.  Because it could have just as easily been us and we felt like we owed it to our brothers and sisters, one county away, to stay vigilant, to stay present, to stay faithful.

Last week the supervisors at my agency bought the line staff pizza.  Out of their own personal monies.  They bought us pizza to thank us for the hard work we do.  It's probably the nicest thing that has happened to me as a county worker (a government worker) in all of my years working for a county which is closing in on a decade, come 2016.  Not that I expect nice things to happen or to be done for me.  Despite popular opinion most of us don't go into public service for the perks and the glory.  Yes, I have retirement and yes, I have medical benefits. I earn those things.  I also have the luxury of working with the people no one else wants to, because somewhere along the line, in the history of humanity, we decided we can't just kill the people who don't behave the way we want them too.  In fact, if you notice, despite everything he did yesterday, the suspect was brought in alive.  Thanks to those pesky government workers. Thanks to your tax dollars.  We will also now continue to deal with him because he is still a human and still has rights and even though we may have moments where we think otherwise, we agree that it is not OK to start killing people who don't behave.  At least not outright.

It' so easy to have scapegoats.  Government workers. Cops. Social workers.  It's so easy to stomp our feet about tax dollars and to point fingers at waste and bureaucracy. It's so easy to complain about the roles we don't ever have to be in.  Until we need to call 911.  Until our car is taken at gun point.  Until our kid is in a classroom on a high school campus where an armed and dangerous subject may be trying to hide.  Until it's us.  I know there is corruption and I know that sometimes the cops and social workers themselves don't behave.  But I still think we matter.  I think the work we do is valuable and worth having some fucking gratitude for.

So I am dedicating this blog to all of the government workers who got paid the same wage during Friday's event, while their lives were on the line, as they do on a typical Friday.  The two deputies that will never come home.  The other two who bore witness to their comrades being slaughtered.  The rest of the first responders who responded.  The dispatchers who worried themselves sick while remaining calm.  The teachers who said reassuring things to their students while they sat in locked classrooms in the dark. The EMT's who responded with the same level of care and responsibility to the fallen officers as they did to the suspect.  The social workers who are busy counseling the families of the victims and the perpetrators.  The DA who gets assigned this case on Monday and the PD, god help you, who owes the alleged assailant his day in court.  You did good.  Quite good for government work. Thank you.