Chapter Three

Inside the System

I’ve never been motivated by titles, awards, or praise. I learned early that chasing approval is a losing game. It’s far easier to live with your own decisions than to live for someone else’s validation.

That understanding made one thing clear: I was never meant for an office.

I enjoyed pre-hospital care and trauma work, but medical school was never in the cards. Anyone who’s seen my high school transcript would laugh at the idea. But once I walked through the locked doors of the Bethlehem Police Department as an employee in Communications, I knew I had found my place.

They call it many things now—public safety telecommunicator, emergency services dispatcher—but in 1984 it was just dispatch. And it was anything but simple.

There were no computers. Everything was handwritten—every phone call, every radio transmission—for the police department, multiple fire districts, and ambulance services. On any given shift we tracked several patrol cars, five fire districts, and EMS units, all in real time, by hand.

There was no room for error. And no time to learn slowly.

Dispatchers weren’t trusted then. A desk sergeant or officer sat beside us at all times. Working A-Line with Sergeant Richard LaChappelle was like attending a private academy. He taught without lecturing. He’d quiz patrol on road temperatures and black ice, and the answers etched themselves into my brain because they mattered.

This was still the old era of policing. Officers would come on duty after nights that hadn’t ended. Roll call wasn’t paid. It wasn’t ceremonial. It was functional—and sometimes revealing. One morning, officers and a dispatcher used a breath device to see who had stopped drinking earliest the night before. I remember feeling proud of a .08 reading—and immediately questioning what that pride said about the culture.

Watching was my education.

I tested well. Despite my academic history, written exams were my strength. I scored at the top of the list and was hired first by the Albany County Sheriff’s Office, then by Bethlehem PD. I wasn’t chasing rank. I wanted stability, a pension, and work that mattered.

In 1988, during my interview, a lieutenant asked if I was prepared to be a patrolman for life. I said yes. I meant it.

Patrol let me do what I did best—run toward crisis, take care of people, and stay grounded in the community I grew up in. The job was often heartbreaking, sometimes absurd, and occasionally funny in ways you couldn’t explain outside the locker room.

Over time, I learned something important: the system doesn’t reward integrity automatically. It rewards compliance. Survival depends on understanding where you stand, who decides, and when to keep your mouth shut.

I didn’t fully understand what that meant yet.

But I was learning.