Waimarino fits the bill for new sergeant

Ruapehu Bulletin, Volume 8, Issue 370, 22 January 1991, Page 5

Waimarino fits the bill for new sergeant

Waimarino's new police sergeant Bob Evans has been waiting for a posting to a station like Waimarino. He comes to the area from a two-man station at Mangakino where he was a police constable. Sgt Evans passed his sergeant's exams some time ago but has been waiting for a posting he liked for a couple of years. "I could have accepted a posting to an Auckland station," he said. "But I like small towns. I was born and raised in Riverton, 26 miles from Invercargill on the coast." Despite coming from so far away, Bob is familiar with this area having served in Wanganui and Turangi in his ten year? with the police.

He spent three years at Wanganui, two of them in the armed offenders squad which saw him attending a couple of callouts to this area. Four and a half years at Turangi followed which he said he quite enjoyed, though he didn't do too much fishing - a sport he likes to spend time at. "My wife, Jennie, had triplets," said Sgt Evans, "which meant spending a lot of time feeding, changing, feeding and changing." He said the family got a lot of help from various sources though, but they still had a lot of work to do. The triplets, two boys and a girl , means they have a balanced family, with an older daughter, but twice the number they expected. Jennie Evans is origi-

nally from Waverley and spent much of her time at Mangakino relief teaching at the primary and secondary schools there. Sgt Evan's top sport of r'owing fitted in well at Mangakino and he worked on establishing a rowing training centre on the hydro lake. Rowing will take a back seat now, with very few rowers around the Waimarino, though Bob said he is still an associate member of a Wanganui Club. He plans to spend some free time fishing, hunting tramping, running and bike riding, which all fit in well with the Waimarino. Though it was the job that attracted him to the area, being in charge of a station in a good area which he said is interesting.