Presidents Message

                Another year has come and gone, it was good to see all of you at the annual conference in St. George. I would like to take a moment and wish President Jim Barker the best now that he has stepped down from UACOA. Jim has done a lot for our association and it will be hard to fill those shoes. Jim served on the board for 3 years before being elected as President of the Utah Animal Control Officers Association. Jim served as President for the past 12 years, in those years Jim has put his heart and soul into making sure that this Association has moved forward with trainings that have helped us all in our careers. Jim, it has been a privilege to serve with you for the past 8 years, you have taught me a lot.  I wish you the best and expect you to give us your advice regularly.

                At our most recent board meeting the board members have discussed the topic on how to certify the members as state animal control officers.   This was talked about extensively. We are looking into this; we ask that you be patient with us in this new transition.

                Board Member Bryan Smith is the New Web Page Administrator.  I encourage all of you to go and use the web page.   It is www.uacoa.org; the web page is more user friendly and easier to get to when you want to look for information and calendared trainings.

                I have thought long and hard on how to approach this next item and I hate to bring it up.   There is no easy way to do it but to hit it on the head and get it out. I was approached by the Ramada Inn Management. They brought to my attention that they had some complaints on some of our members on the way they acted during our stay.

                All of us have been hired by cities or counties to represent them in a professional and unique way. Most of us are not LEO certified but we are held to the same expectations as they. We have pride in how we do our jobs; this should be off the job as well as on the job. We have discipline on how we handle certain things that will reflect back on to our departments.   The dictionary say; DISCIPLINE, TRAINING TO ACT IN ACCORDANCE WITH RULES, ACTIVITY, EXERCISE, OR A REGIMENT THAT DEVELOPS OR IMPROVES A SKILL; TRAINING, PUNISHMENT INFLICTED BY WAY OR CORRECTION AND TRAINING, BEHAVIOR IN ACCORDANCE  WITH RULES OF CONDUCT. WE HAVE INTERGERTY, the dictionary says; INTEGRITY IS, UNCOMPROMISING ADHERENCE TO MORAL AND ETHICAL PRINCIPLES; SOUNDNESS OF MORAL CHARACTER; HONESTY.  WE ARE PROFESSIONALS, the dictionary says; PROFESSIONAL, A PERSON WHO IS EXPERT AT HIS OR HER WORK.

                I just want to remind everyone that it is good to let our hair down every now and then, but we need to remember that we are representing our cities and counties.  What we do in the public eye can really blacken it and that with every action is a consequence that we have to answer too. Even though we are out of class for the day, how we act and how we represent ourselves comes back on everyone of us, and our departments. We need to remember that our cities or counties are paying us to be trained and that we are on their dime.  We are in their vehicles and most important we are REPRESENTATIVES of those cities and counties.  

                As we move along through the year, I wish you all the best in your lives.  Remember to be safe in whatever you do. Remember that Pam is always needing and wanting to hear about our most embarrassing miss- haps that happen while we are working….

Justin Hatch

Utah Animal Control Officers Association President

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