Thought I'd share one of my latest adventures on the job;
"S.O. to Unit 4"
"Unit 4," I answered. It's early in the shift and things have been slow so far today.
"Unit 4, please go to 245 William's Ranch Road and see a Mr. Jason about a disturbance."
"10-4 S.O., I'm in route. ETA about 15 minutes. Can you advise what the disturbance is about?"
"Ah, Unit 4 . . . ah, standby."
After a couple of minutes with no additional communications I keyed the radio mic again, "Unit 4 to S.O., do you have additional info on the disturbance on William's Range Road?"
"S.O. to Unit 4, negative. Be advised that Unit 1" (i.e., the sheriff) "said to tell you to use your own discretion on this one."
What the heck? I wonder what the sheriff's involvement in this call is? Unlike some sheriff's departments, we put a lot of time and effort in training of our dispatchers and I'm always bragging on what a good job they do. They know better than to send a deputy off on any call, much less a disturbance call, without as much information as possible. Since the sheriff was directly involved I'm comfortable that they're not sending me in harm's way blindly, but still, a hint at what's going on would be nice.
About 10 minutes later I turn off the two lane Arkansas state highway onto county maintained Williams Ranch Road. This area for the past 25 years or so used to be cattle raising country, and before that it was row crop farm land, mainly cotton. The Williams family owned hundreds of acres for several generations, but the last batch of grown kids sold off most of the place to a developer who built some pretty nice houses on 5 acre plots in what used to be the farm.
When I found #245 on the mailbox I turned into the driveway of nice brick house, probably about 3,500 sq ft with a triple garage. I also noticed a pool around back. As I parked my patrol car and got out a gentleman came out the front door and greeted me. I walked around the front of my car and we shook hands.
"Hello, I'm Rick Jason." He was close to 40 years old, pretty fit, dressed in khaki's and a red golf shirt.
"Good morning Mr. Jason, I'm Deputy Faulkner. I was asked to come see you about a disturbance, how can I help you?"
"Deputy Faulkner, my wife and I moved here about three weeks ago. We wanted to get out of the city and enjoy the good life out in the country."
"Where are ya'll from Mr. Jason?" I asked
"We are originally from Memphis. I work for a financial firm and transferred to the Little Rock office but I actually do most of my work from home and long as I can get internet service."
I said, "ain't technology great when it works."
He looked at me with an odd look and replied, "well, yes, but getting reliable internet out here in the boonies has been a challenge."
With a smile I asked, "So, Mr. Jason, did you ask for someone from the sheriff's office to come help you with you with your internet service?"
"No, absolutely not. I've something much more serious than that troubling us. The people living over on that farm place over there have a bunch of farm animals and such." He pointed to the old Williams farm place, what was left of the original homestead. One of the Williams boys and his family were still living there on about 30 acres and running a few head of cattle.
"Okay, so what's the problem?" I persisted.
"Every morning before daylight there is a God awful racket when first one, then two, then half a dozen roosters start crowing. They keep at it sometimes for an hour or so. My wife and I have tried to ignore it or just get used to it, but it has become intolerable."
I just stared at him for what must have been half a minute . . . thinking. This is what the sheriff meant when he told the dispatcher to tell me to use my own discretion.
"Mr. Jason, did you go speak to Mr. Williams about his roosters disturbing you and your wife?"
"I did," he answered.
"And?"
"He didn't seem too receptive to resolving the issue. In fact, he laughed at me. I told him I was going to call the sheriff's office and he said to go ahead. So here we are."
"Well, Mr. Jason, I gotta tell you, there is no law against roosters crowing out in the county. In fact, it's what roosters do. Country folks keep them around on purpose so they'll start crowing around daylight. It's like when you move into a house next to an airport you have to expect to hear airplanes flying about. So when you move in next to a farm you are likely to hear barnyard animals making noises. Also, I hate to tell you this, but when summertime gets here and things warm up a bit you'll have the pleasure of smelling those barnyard animals too, especially in the evening when you and you're family are sitting around the pool out back." I pointed over to the Williams' barn and continued, "best I can tell they don't have any hogs, but the cattle have an aroma all their own."
"Good Lord, I didn't even think of that! What . . . what can you do about it?"
"Me?" I said. "I have no intention of doing anything about it, there are no laws being broken here. The way I see it you have two options. #1, you and the Mrs. can suck it up and assimulate to country living, or #2, you can pack up and move to town."
He just stood there looking at me for a long while. Finally I said, "Mr. Jason, is there anything else I can do for you this morning?"
"No, no I guess not. Thank you for coming out."
"You're welcome!" I shook his hand and left.
About a week later I was in the area and decided to patrol down Williams Range Road. As I passed by Mr. Jason's home I notced a "for sale" sign in the front yard.
