The employees of County Animal Control, especially the group from the mid to late 1980's which I truly feel was the "golden age"in the department, were more of a "family" than it became by the 2000's.
Yes there were your 'brothers' and 'sisters' you liked and the ones you didn't. But being a small organization as it was at that time definitely made for close friendships and more than a few "relationships". As the department grew and expanded through the 1990's the distance between staff grew too. There were and always will be friends, one or two or a few, but nothing like it was with shifts being friends and socializing even off duty and with the other shifts and clerical staff too. Later on friends in the field staff kept with the field staff, friends in the shelter staff with the shelter staff, friends in the clerical staff usually just worked and went home, just no longer one united department.
Except at the Christmas Party. Those went from most of the department get togethers for good food and entertainment, to the last few I went to and then heard about when I quit going to them were it seemed to become people going and watching people get stupid drunk and embarrassing not only themselves but the department too.
I think that the departmental comradeship peaked in 1984/85 when the program manager at the time united almost the entire department by being a total A#@ H*&%!!!
Just about everybody wanted him GONE! He was, maybe still is?, arrogant, condescending and seemed to almost enjoy publicly insulting the employees. Nowadays, in our more 'enlightened time', employees often, but not always!, have a recourse. Back then, he was a god! or so he kept acting and telling employees! "Pat" was the kind of guy that probably shouldn't have ever been promoted to any kind of leadership role. I think he got it by his resume and the at the time prevalent "boys club" mentality. His arrogance ultimately was his own undoing and while he was off on an extended vacation he was investigated for "misappropriations of County Funds", or so we were told. We never saw him again and the rumor then was he'd been given the choice of resigning and leaving quietly or being publicly charged. He left!
The person that was got the job after him wound up being the 'top dog' for the rest of my time there before leaving, and again a situation of go quietly or else, just a few months before we left. But that will be another story.
