When Sherrie Gasque landed a temporary job at the SC Highway Patrol District 5 headquarters, she was hoping to put in 28 years — maybe 30. But this year, she will soon celebrate 35 years with the agency.
“All those years ago when I walked into that office, I knew this is where I belong,” said Gasque, Administrator Coordinator I for the Highway Patrol’s Troop 5 headquarters.
A Dillon native and the daughter of a South Carolina trooper who served 30 years, Gasque was job hunting in 1989 and stopped by the Highway Patrol district headquarters in Florence to fill out an application.
She interviewed, and that same day was offered a job as a clerical specialist — overseeing time sheets and leave requests, typing up statements from troopers involved in collisions or wrecks, and other tasks around the office.
“It’s a lot like what we do now,” Gasque said. “But at that time it was paper time sheets and paper leave requests. Everything was done on paper back then.”
After two years, the Highway Patrol hired Gasque as a full-time administrative specialist. But in 2001, amid a workforce reduction, she took a position as a telecommunications officer in the Conway “radio room.” In those days, Gasque said, nearly every troop in the state had its own telecommunications center. Some had more than one.
“You have to be able to multi-task,” she said of adjusting to life in telecommunications. “You’re answering the phone, taking information from the public, and you also have troopers that may be calling on the radio with a traffic stop or collision information.”
“You want to make sure the troopers you’re dispatching get to go home every night or every morning, just like you do,” she said.
After five years in the telecommunications center, Gasque returned to the front office of Troop 5 headquarters in 2006. Not only does the team in Troop 5 work well together and get their tasks accomplished; they have a few laughs while doing it, Gasque said. She credits the family-like atmosphere.
“If you can’t laugh and joke a little and enjoy what you’re doing, that’s going to make for a rough day at work,” she said. “As long as I’m enjoying what I’m doing and the people I work with, I’ll stay. But if you get to the point where you don’t enjoy your job, it’s time to go.”
“Luckily, I’m not at that point,” she added.