'It's a Calling': John Roscoe's Police Career Involved More Than the Cars, Shoes & Sirens
John and Renee Roscoe (center), are flanked by sons Kyle and Ryan and Renee’s parents Diane and Richard Buckley.
John Roscoe has several perspectives of The Vision.
One came when he was 5 years old, growing up in Northeast Philadelphia. Roscoe told his father that he wanted to grow up to become a police officer. The appeal was the blue cars, the shiny shoes, and the sirens.
The second emerges in his rear-view mirror.
On June 1, Roscoe retired as a captain after a decorated 30-year career in the Avalon Police Department. The cars, shoes, and sirens have been joined by commendations, recognition for his work, and a reputation for launching dialogue, the fuel between a police department and the community.
The unknown part of his vision, its next phase, is up now.
The decompression from police executive to private citizen figures to come gradually because for 30 years, Roscoe was on high alert. It was the type of focus he needed to do the job.
“I always considered this to be a vocation more than a career,” says the Cape May Court House resident. “It’s a calling, something I always knew I wanted to do. I wanted to do good things for this community and was always proud and honored to wear the uniform of Avalon.
“In a way, I feel like I owe Avalon. It was where I met my wife Renee.”
There’s some irony in Roscoe’s journey. When he was growing up, his grandfather owned a house in Stone Harbor and Roscoe never stepped foot in Avalon. He became “Cooler by a Mile” only after graduating with a criminal-justice degree at Penn State, discovering a job opening in Avalon and applying for it.
One thing led to another, and Roscoe became an officer.
Along the way, friends introduced him to Renee. They will have been married 24 years in October and have two children: Kyle, 21, and Ryan, 17.
More family time is on the horizon for Roscoe, who brought both type-A intensity and empathy to this profession.
“John is a one-of-a-kind person,” says Avalon Police Chief Jeff Christopher, who worked closely with him since the 1990s. “Right from the start, one of his strongest qualities was an ability to connect with people and form relationships. He would meet people on the street and encourage them to stay in contact with him.
“When you meet John, you consider him a friend. When you work in a smaller community as we do, you get to know the residents more than in a bigger town. Everybody knows John. He is an incredibly loyal person, and he had a wonderful work ethic throughout his career.”
According to Christopher, these were some of Roscoe’s career highlights:
He received the Valedictorian Award in the Command & Leadership Academy, conducted by the New Jersey State Association of Chiefs of Police. This is a 12-week course, held once a week, teaching complex leadership theories modeled after the West Point leadership program.
Roscoe earned a Bravery Award in 1999 for entering a burning building to rescue a resident.
He received numerous awards from MADD (Mothers Against Drunk Driving) for his many DWI arrests.
Roscoe received a distinguished achievement award for his involvement in a tragic incident and an award for his response to a domestic violence incident.
He received 15 commendations from supervisors for incidents in which he went above and beyond the call of duty.
Roscoe mirrored Christopher’s sentiments about dialogue. He regards awards as part of the job and places higher value on letters from community members.
“It’s more than just reaching out,” he says. “It’s taking the time to talk to people. Everybody has something to say. We see people at their lowest points, in many instances. We are not there because everybody is happy. Our job should be to find out the root cause of a problem and solve it.
“People will yell and scream and say that they pay our salaries. But apart from that, everybody, even the chronic complainer, has a root cause, an issue. And you won’t know what that is unless you ask.”
Some people will tell you right away, he says. Some will hold back until they are ready.
“But the important thing is to develop a relationship,” he says. “If somebody is happy with the way I did things, they may be more willing to come to talk to us about something else.”
As for overall observations, Roscoe considers Avalon a good town because its residents care about the community. Otherwise, many issues are the same no matter where one works. Roscoe remains mindful of the risk all police officers carry every day.
“It’s really the only job in the United States where you go to work and you wear armor,” he says. “You do your job every day and, in every place, even in Avalon, you know you may or may not come home afterward.
“You are tasked with this power that somebody could shoot you or you would have to take somebody’s life. It’s a scary prospect and it involves a decision that would have to be made in a split second. This is not a video game. You don’t get three tries.”
Roscoe appears to have enjoyed his tenure in the department. As time wore on, he got weary of night shifts that ended at 3am, bringing the adrenaline that might keep him up to see the sun. His family was on an opposite schedule.
“Your body takes longer to recover from things,” he laughs.
What advice would 30-year veteran John Roscoe give to himself at 21?
“My tips would be, ‘Don’t be so naïve, be absolutely thorough, do the best you can and don’t let anyone come up behind you.’”
Roscoe believes overall police work has become more difficult in recent years because of declining government support for law enforcement.
It’s a situation he has retired from now.
Little by little, Roscoe hears the sound of the next era.
It is rooted in guitar strings.
Roscoe plays guitar with Independence Day, a group of active and retired police and firefighters. They have been together in varied forms, under different band names, for about 15 years. The quality of their music is good.
They make the local circuit and, ironically, will play at Princeton Bar & Grill on June 30.
This is the first time, realistically, that Roscoe can perform in Avalon. Doing so while he was employed here would have involved time-consuming paperwork, per regulations. It was easier to just play in a neighboring town.
No paperwork now. No regs. Just book the gig and do it.
This time, if Roscoe sees police cars, it might be his buddies coming to watch him play.
