The following student report was submitted by Ambassador League Agent Zachary W. during the 2007-2008 League.
Interview with Representative Rick Jones
Rep. Rick Jones was born November 17, 1952 and grew up in Battle Creek, Michigan. He attended Lakeview High School. He graduated and entered Western Michigan University, majoring in psychology. While there he decided to go into law enforcement, and so transferred to Kellogg Community College. Jones obtained his Bachelor's Degree in Criminal Justice from Michigan State University. He began working in the Eaton County Sheriff's Office in 1974, and moved up through the ranks before eventually becoming sheriff in 2000, a position he held until 2004. After 31 years at the Sheriff's Office, Rick successfully ran for the Michigan House in 2004. He was named by the Lansing State Journal as the most effective freshman legislator during his first term in office, sponsoring 22 bills during his two-year term. He was re-elected in 2006, and currently serves on the Commerce, Judiciary, Labor, and Oversight & Investigations committees. He is actively involved at Grand Ledge First United Methodist Church. He has been married to his wife, Charlene, for 34 years, and they have two children, Kate and Charlie. Q: What motivated you to seek your current position? A: At the end of my 31 years at Eaton County I made the decision that I was going to move on, I had spent 33 years total in law enforcement. I decided to run for the State Legislature so that I could help write some of the laws that I had been enforcing. I had a lot of ideas that I wanted to implement. Going from my career in police work to a career in Lansing, I felt that I could actually do something that would change things across Michigan. Q: What training do you think is important to prepare you for your position? A: Well, I certainly think that, to be a State Senator or Representative, you need to have a variety of experience, work experience as well as life experience. I see a lot of young legislators who get elected right out of college who don't know what it's like to be married or have children or a house or a mortgage and who haven't had another job working for a living. I feel that people are better legislators if they come here after they have had another career in something, whatever it is. Q: What are the greatest rewards of your work? A: The greatest rewards are helping people. A big part of my job is not just passing legislation but helping people. My office gets 200 calls per month from people who need help with something. It may be something minor like not getting their tax return, or it might be something like the City of Bellevue approaching me concerning roadwork that would create a detour that would force many local businesses to close. That is what is rewarding about my job. Q: What are the greatest challenges of your work? A: I think the greatest challenge of this job is, if you're going to do a good job, you need to spend a great deal of time with your constituents. That makes it tough to have a lot of family time. You have to try to balance it by spending a lot of time with your constituents, but also putting aside some family time. That would be the toughest part about the job. Q: What role, if any, does faith play in your work? A: A great deal. People who don't have faith have less success here in Lansing. They are less caring and less compassionate. People that have faith are more motivated and are willing to sacrifice for the right thing. Having faith is very important, in my mind, to be successful. Q: What would you recommend for students like me who would eventually like to work in a position such as yours? What career path, skills, or things would they need to do or take? A: The first thing I would recommend would be that you go to college, seeking your degree in some field where there is sure employment. Spend time in that career, and then decide to run for office. Some skills you would need for this office, some of the classes you might need to take, would be public speaking, or speech. You should have the ability to write well, since you can't always depend on other people to write things for you. I would also recommend that young people get involved in politics. Not necessarily running for office, but volunteering on a political campaign, going door to door, putting up signs, making phone calls. There are also many internships available that would help you along in this career.
