May 1999 Volume 80 Number 5
"serving the protectors"
| May 1999 Volume 80 Number 5 "serving the protectors" |
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| Country Committed | |
| By Brett
Williams |
A lucrative job offer from the private sector wouldn’t be enough to lure SA’s recently proclaimed Police Officer of the Year away from law enforcement. Senior Constable Rick O’Dea intends simply to remain a committed country cop for the rest of his working days, despite his potentially high-earning public relations skills.
“It’s lifestyle you’ve got to look at,” he says. “The lifestyle here (at Burra) is absolutely fantastic, and I’m too entrenched in being a policeman. I can’t really see myself leaving the job.”
O’Dea spoke of his commitment to policing after receiving the Police Officer of the Year award during a formal ceremony in Rundle Mall last month. The award was recognition for his tireless efforts in establishing and managing the Errappa Blue Light Camp, a world-class facility at Iron Knob for youth development.
O’Dea’s burning ambition to establish the facility first emerged three years ago. Despite “long hours, knock-backs” and times “wondering if the camp would survive”, his dedication to its success never wavered.
“I thought: ‘We need something like this (camp)’,” he remembers. “It’s about (youth) overcoming problems without resorting to drugs, alcohol, violence or suicide.”
Nominated for the award previously, O’Dea, 37, “had an inkling” that his name had been put forward again but never expected to win. He says he was both humbled and honoured to receive the award, which he sees as recognition of many police officers’ out-of-hours work.
But serving others in his own time has always come naturally to O’Dea. He was greatly inspired by his late police officer father, John, himself a one-time nominee for the Police Officer of the Year award. He died from a stroke in 1988 at the age of 54.
O’Dea was deeply saddened that his father - in whose footsteps he’d followed as a country cop - wasn’t able to see him receive his award. He remembers him as his hero, and maintains vivid childhood memories.
“We moved around the country from different stations,” he says. “Dad was OC (officer-in-charge) most of the time. We were usually at the housing attached to the station, and you’d have prisoners in the cells as we were playing around the backyard.
“I just have great memories of being around police stations. He (dad) was always community-minded but wasn’t real keen on me being a policeman.”
And O’Dea, a former sea scout, very nearly allayed his father’s concerns. A naval career beckoned in 1979, and with entry papers in hand, he was set to become a sailor. But when a job opportunity behind the thin blue line arose first, he chose policing.
As an 18-year-old he began a two-year police cadet course at Fort Largs. He graduated with the JB Walsh Public Relations trophy in 1981. And perhaps predictably, one of his first moves was to apply for a country posting. He was sent to Whyalla.
In the 17 years since then, O’Dea has selflessly served communities in many of the State’s northern country regions.
Some of his most treasured memories are of life in the small town of Cockburn, just west of Broken Hill, where he ran a one-person police station in the early ’90s.
“There were only about 35 people,” he recalls, “and there were probably about 50 outside the town in my (police) district. Just being a part of that community was like being in a big family - it was great.
“The people were really down-to-earth, and they appreciated the help that you did give them.”
But almost like an itinerant lawman of the old American West, O’Dea kept moving. He returned to Whyalla in 1995, where he first conceived his Errappa Blue Light Camp idea.
And even after three years’ ceaseless devotion to its realization, O’Dea again felt “the time had come” to move on. “I’ve moved around all my life,” he says. “It was coming up to five years being in the Whyalla area, and four years is the longest I’ve been in a place.
“The camp had built up into a good, viable concern, and I was comfortable leaving it in good hands and just looking forward to another challenge.”
But was he saddened to leave his beloved youth facility?
“Certainly,” he says, “and the biggest sadness is leaving the people who have helped me. It (the camp) will be a part of my life about which I’ll say: ‘That was fantastic’.
“It was the part that I enjoyed even more than Cockburn, because you’re helping a lot of groups of kids, especially ones that are disadvantaged. You get good smiles and thanks from helping them have a good time.”
So in mid-May, O’Dea joined former Police Officer of the Year, Constable Russell Disher, to form Burra’s two-man police force.
Despite highly publicized tensions which arose between the Burra community and its police last year, O’Dea held no concerns about living in and serving the town. “I like taking on a challenge,” he says, “and I followed the problems that were here at Burra.
“I’d like to get involved in the community in a substantial way (and) help it get over some of those problems.”
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