Photo By Patrick Adelmann | U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Fort Worth District park rangers pose for a photo with...... read more read more
A small child’s life jacket is on the beach and she’s nowhere to be found. Two men are playing loud music while drinking at a campsite and one of them has a sidearm. A man sits on his tailgate with protected Native American artifacts and digging materials in plain view.
It hasn’t even been 30 minutes into their annual ranger refresher training and U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’ Fort Worth District Park Rangers already have their hands full with complicated scenarios.
Park rangers from throughout the district converged on the Hopkins County Civic Center and Cooper Lake State Park for their annual ranger refresher training and awards ceremony, Feb. 13-16, 2024.
The training included scenarios like those above, which mimic real life situations that have occurred throughout USACE.
“This is training that gives our park rangers the tools to be safe while they are conducting their job,” said Brad Ellis, the USACE Lake Manager at Granger Lake. “So, it's important that they get these skills, and they hone them so that they're safe and they go home at the end of the day.”
In its seventh iteration, the formalized training ensures that all district park rangers have the training required by USACE to maintain citation authority. Along with the scenarios, park rangers must complete eight hours of mandatory training which includes subjects such as verbal defense instruction, self-defense tactics, policy, and incident reporting.
By bringing all the park rangers together at one location the district can ensure the training is standardized and done right.
From the newest park ranger to the most seasoned, everyone leaves the training with something new in their inventory of skills. From citation writing to the proper way to complete an agriculture lease, even the most seasoned park ranger comes away with more knowledge.
Zane Allen has been a park ranger at Hords Creek Lake for four months and already sees the benefit to the in-person training.
“I think it's great that you get to learn what's going on outside of your project,” Allen said. “There's only one other ranger at Hords Creek so I have a lot on my plate. I'm new too, so just learning about the things that I'm in charge, or that I don't necessarily know about yet, is one of the best takeaways.”
With new scenarios every year even seasoned park rangers can be caught off guard with something new.
Jarod Briscoe, the lead park ranger at Whitney Lake, has been a ranger for more than seven years. He remembers when the 2021 ranger refresher brought the pandemic to training. One of the scenarios was based on an injured lake visitor, nothing new, but the twist was that the person was COVID positive.
“At first it was a gray area for me, do I risk my own health and wellbeing for someone else who shouldn’t have been there in the first place,” Briscoe said. “In the end, I know I go into every situation not knowing the outcome. I have to make a judgement call. Sometimes, that means placing those in need first.”
At the conclusion of two days of training, it was time for yearly awards.
Col. Calvin Kroeger, Fort Worth District Commander, took the stage to recognize deserving park rangers. Rangers from Whitney Lake were recognized with a certificate of appreciation for their overall water safety program. Madison Wetterstroem was awarded a Civil Service Commendation Medal for her dedicated support to the water safety mission. The final award recognized the Park Ranger of the Year. Each of the four regions made a nomination for the award. This year’s nominees were:
Landon McCartney, Bardwell Lake, Trinity Region
Alexander Klepac, Stillhouse Hollow Lake, Capital Region
Tyler Slovacek, Sam Rayburn Lake, Piney Woods Region
Kathryn Devers, Whitney Lake, Three Rivers Region
In the end, Klepac was recognized as the Fort Worth District’s 2024 Park Ranger of the Year for all his hard work at Stillhouse Hollow and for the district. He will be the district’s nomination for the Corps of Engineers’ Natural Resource Management Employee of the Year.
For Ellis, who has been with the district for more than 16 years, and part of the ranger refresher program since its inception, it was good to see some of his students now give back to the program.
“I saw them when they were students, and I knew that they would one day become my replacements,” Ellis said. “It's been amazing to see these rangers grow and now become instructors.”
As park rangers headed back to their lakes, planning for next year’s event already got under way.
Editor's note: The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has hundreds of career fields with new jobs posting on daily basis. For more information search ‘USACE’ on USAJobs.gov
| Date Taken: | 03.06.2024 |
| Date Posted: | 03.06.2024 10:14 |
| Story ID: | 465456 |
| Location: | SULPHUR SPRINGS, TX, US |
| Web Views: | 329 |
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