Skip to content

Is that in My Job Description?

Job descriptions for staff positions with Family Promise can be rather daunting and perhaps somewhat impractical.  How do you possibly incorporate all about this beautiful, wonderful, interesting, and sometimes messy work at Family Promise into a single document?  
Our job descriptions were tested in a rather unique manner this past week.  Shaun LePage, a part time Family Service Coordinator with FPL was working with one of Temporary Housing residents last week, and learned there was a groundhog co-habitating under the porch of the Grace House.  This creature was large enough that he was causing quite the racket, especially at night.  The groundhog was also of course, causing quite a bit of concern to the Mom who lives there with her 22-month old daughter.
After much gathering of information and consulting experts, Shaun proposed we set a humane live animal trap for the little co-habitating groundhog, so we could catch him outside of the porch, and then seal off the entrance so he would have to find another dwelling.  This seemed like a good idea to all, so Shaun went to work on setting the humane live trap.
Day 1 – trap tipped over (wonder if the groundhog is too large?)
Day 2 – no groundhog, but Shaun did trap a creature…a skunk… yikes!
Was this in his job description?
Apparently there are precious few in our community who are equipped for removing “nuisance animals” (as skunks are referred to in such circles.)  One organization that does this work in our region, was out of town last week, so Shaun went back to work researching!  As it turns out, Shaun removed the skunk himself and released him out of the city limits near a lovely wooded area.   Skunk is happy, Mom and daughter are happy, Shaun is happy he did not get sprayed, and the groundhog is happy since he didn’t get caught!

The groundhog is still co-habitating, but I doubt if another live trap is in our future.  We are very grateful to Shaun.  The Mom in the Grace House called him a superstar!  I don’t think I will rewrite his job description, however…