A small, gray-haired man in uniform sits in a small room behind a gray door labeled “Public Safety.”

In front of him sits a laptop computer and a red and white nameplate reading “Chief Tom Younce.” To his left sits an assortment of officials.

Atop the new Vaughn Towers at Carter-Finley Stadium, they are provided a unique bird’s eye view.

But while the crowd in the stands watches the Wolfpack struggle with the Terrapins on Nov. 26, everyone in the tower room watches the crowd in the stands.

A call comes in on the CB radio. A person in one of the Vaughn Towers boxes is throwing things out a window.

The chief stands up authoritatively, retrieves his hat and coat, and sets off to the perpetrator’s box.

Upon his return several minutes later, his colleagues ask how it went and he reports that the occupants have agreed to stay away from the window.

“Were they intoxicated, chief?” a Raleigh police captain inquired.

“They weren’t intoxicated,” the chief replied with his southern-tinged voice and shook his head, “They were drunk as hell.”

He smiles and takes his seat, turns toward the window and refocuses his attention to the thousands of people below him.

A child on the move

Chief Younce, who came to N.C. State in 2000 to fill the position of director of Campus Police, is no stranger to football games or even sports in general.

“I’m not big enough to play football,” the five-foot-six-inch officer admitted, “But I grew up around athletics – I liked it, my dad liked it, my mom tolerated it.”

Although born in Florence, S.C., Younce, the middle child, was raised in more than one location. His father, Clarence Younce, was a Baptist minister and an Army chaplain and was constantly on the move, taking his wife and three children with him. Sue Delle Younce, his mother, “was a homemaker – she was stuck with the kids,” he said.

“I was a pretty good kid,” he said. “One time I stole my brother’s marbles when I was 6.”

In his first six years of schooling he attended seven different schools in South Carolina, Japan, Alabama and Georgia, but he attended all four years of high school at Baker High School in Columbus, Ga.

After playing football his freshman year, he “got tied up” in student government and became student body president during his senior year.

Although active in high school programs and at church and holding a part time job at a convenience store, Younce claims he was an average student.

“I graduated,” he said frankly with a smirk.

Just as his brother was graduating from Auburn, Younce came in behind him paying only in-state tuition because he was the child of a minister.

“I don’t think they do that anymore,” he laughed, donning a blue and orange tie with a pattern of tigers and “Auburn.”

There he worked towards a degree in physical education, hoping to become a high school football coach one day. Pursuing his love of athletics, he refereed high school and college basketball and college intramural sports almost every night.

During his senior year he went to every Auburn football game, home and away.

“It took me 5 years to get through 4 years of college,” he said. “I had a good time.”

Younce went on to earn his Master’s degree in Criminal Justice at George Washington University.

Love drives fast

A year later, in September 1969, he was working speed enforcement at Pope Air Force Base in Fayetteville, N.C. One day a woman drove past him at 15 miles over the speed limit, so he pulled her over and wrote her a ticket.

That October, he ran into the same woman at a party on base and found out her father, a judge, had “let her off” – Younce claims that rendezvous “didn’t go well.” But he invited her to go out with him on his ski boat and from there the relationship grew.

Tom and Joyce dated for 6 or 7 months, got engaged before he was shipped off to Thailand to serve, and were married when he came back on leave.

“My father told me that was the most expensive speeding ticket I’ve ever given,” he chuckled.

He and his wife have been married for 34 years.

The couple lived in Montgomery County, Md. for five years while Younce worked at Andrews Air Force Base. When his wife gave birth to their first child, they decided to name her Tara, the famed title of Scarlett O’Hara’s house from “Gone With the Wind” to remind her she comes from the South.

‘A great career’ begins

A career as a policeman was “decided for me,” says the former member of the ROTC program at Auburn. Given a choice between a job in physical education, military intelligence and police, Younce chose to join the Air Force military police – a choice he says he does not at all regret.

“I’ve had a lot of fun. It’s been and still is a great career,” Younce said. “It couldn’t’ve been better if I’d planned it.”

“I’ve never had a job I didn’t like,” he said without a second thought.

In fact, his job has brought him face to face with some big names over the years.

Once he stopped a car and glimpsed a man in the backseat. He squinted and looked harder, saying, “Don’t I know you from somewhere?” before realizing he was staring at the face of Bob Hope.

For a time, Younce worked with security on Andrews Air Force Base for President Nixon. While waiting for the president’s plane to arrive one day, he was in charge of keeping the media out of the press pit until a given time.

One reporter was particularly adamant and demanded that Younce let him into the restricted area. “Do you know who I am?” he questioned the military police officer.

“Yes, I know who you are, but I can’t let you by,” Younce replied as he looked into the ambitious eyes of Dan Rather.

On a backstage tour of Cape Canaveral he walked beside diplomats and politicians, including Nixon.

Younce mentions he served as a driver for Governor Jim Hunt for a while.

“One time I drove for the attorney general and went right off the road – I fell asleep. I never drove for him again,” he laughed.

Back to the South

In the summer of 1976, the Younce family moved to North Carolina, the state in which each member still resides. The head of their family had earned the title of chief and worked with the Fuquay-Varina Police Department.

Adam, their second child, was born in 1980, and in 1982 the family moved again, this time to Wilson, N.C.

Glen Allen, police chief in Henderson, N.C. has known Chief Younce for 23 years and worked under him in Wilson.

“He’s a skilled police professional – I have a lot of respect for him,” Allen said.

Describing his former superior as a special leader, Allen said, “[He’s] not autocratic. He prefers the employees be involved in decision-making. He prompts them to be involved.”

Allen currently serves as president of the North Carolina Police Chief Association, an organization for which Younce is vice president and, in two months, Allen’s successor as president.

“He was a great influence on me as a police officer and administrator. He increased my professionalism and self-esteem and I’m trying to do the same thing [in Henderson],” Allen said.

According to Allen, Chief Younce is a clever guy.

“He always could find a way around obstacles. If he hit a dead end he would back up, reassess, and find another way,” Allen said.

Once, in a budget proposal, Younce requested the implementation of a horse patrol.

“That was the flavor of the month,” Allen said, laughing, “The [city] council discussed it ad nauseam.”

In the hubbub over the horses, the council paid little attention to the rest of the proposal – including a 10 percent pay raise for employees.

“He just slipped it by,” Allen said.

“Even if you disagreed with him – and I’ve disagreed with him on a few things – he was consistent and fair. As long as someone treats you fairly, you can’t ask for more than that,” Allen said.

Like a duck in water

He was almost always near it growing up, and still enjoys it today: he’s interested in “anything to do with water,” Younce confessed, gesturing toward a row of North Carolina lighthouse figurines lining the top of a bookshelf behind him.

Whether it was the Atlantic Ocean, the Mobile Bay, the Pee Dee River or any body of water – he wanted to be there.

“I had a sweet deal in Wilson,” Younce, an experienced scuba diver, explained.

While he was serving as police chief, the fire chief retired and asked Younce to take over his job as well. The chief agreed to take over the added responsibility as long as he was compensated accordingly.

With the extra funds, he got certified as a scuba diver and took his first diving trip in the Virgin Islands.

Now he is also a certified scuba diving teacher and has made over 300 dives in the Caribbean, Pacific, Atlantic and the Gulf of Mexico.

In the future he hopes to dive the Indian Ocean.

“Well I’m not diving in the Arctic, so [the Indian Ocean] is the only one left,” Younce said.

In 1999 he spent 3 weeks in Australia working on a Coral Sea dive boat in order to experience it for himself and “bumming around the country, camping in the Outback,” he says as he looks at a souvenir picture of him holding a koala bear.

“He’s always got a deal,” Allen marvels, “But he’s not a spendthrift.”

Allen remembers Younce telling him to never pay full price for hotel rooms.

“He’d work on a cruise ship bussing tables just for fun, just so he could be there,” he said, “And it works out great. He always has money to do what he wants to do.”

The aquatic fanatic is also a water skier and another one of his personal goals is to complete the slalom course. “I can’t get around that third buoy,” Younce griped.

Even today he cannot stay away from the water. He owns a boat, which he bought from the Air Force in 1987, and a house on Lake Royale in Bunn, N.C.

The only problem with staying by the lake is the waterfowl, he says.

“Those geese leave droppings the size of dogs,” he said with a boyish grin, “I have a water balloon sling-shot and a little remote control boat, so I chase ’em.”

A change of scenery

The long-time City of Wilson Police Chief retired in December of 1994 and soon chose to briefly leave his family and take an 8-month assignment in Haiti with the U.S. Justice Department.

“At first I thought they said ‘Hawaii,'” Younce chuckled.

There he helped train the country’s first civilian police force. He claims it was a great experience.

“I got to work with police officers from around the world,” he said.

Younce reflects on one of the craziest on-duty situations he’s ever encountered. One night the officers got a call reporting a man had been found murdered in a field. They went out to the specified area and asked a citizen nearby where they could find the murdered body. The man assured them no one had been murdered.

“Well what about the dead guy in the field?” they questioned.

“Oh, he wasn’t murdered,” the man replied matter-of-factly, “He was a werewolf. We killed him.”

The people in Haiti are not at all like Americans, Younce said and speaks of a woman who was stoned to death for witchcraft – she had touched a child, made it sick, and had been unable to provide healing.

Upon leaving the country, Younce took the mattress he had used and gave it to some villagers.

“There was a six year old who’d never slept on a mattress,” he said.

When he returned home, he was asked to take a similar assignment in Bosnia.

“My wife said, ‘If you go, don’t come back,'” Younce remembers with a smile, “I dunno if she was kidding or not.”

But instead of leaving the country again, he took a position at East Carolina University as Assistant Director of its police department.

Welcome to the Pack

After four years with the Pirates, Younce accepted the post of Campus Police Chief at NCSU and he and his wife moved to Garner, N.C.

David Ranier, associate vice chancellor for environmental health and safety at NCSU and Younce’s boss, was involved in his hiring.

“We advertised competitively and he was the best candidate,” Ranier said, “Chief Younce is professional, patient and understanding. It was under his tutelage that we received our accreditation.”

Younce says he has enjoyed his time so far at NCSU even though 90 percent of what he does is “in-basket, out-basket, e-mail and telephone.”

“My job is to coordinate things, people, what people need,” he explained.

“A typical day is 24 hours, but there is no such thing as a typical day,” he admits as he taps a stylus on the screen of his PDA.

The chief generally works from 8 a.m. until 5 or 6 p.m., but is on call 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

“The only time I’m not on duty is when I’m on vacation,” he said.

During weeks that end with football games, 40 to 50 percent of his day is consumed by organizing police involvement for the event.

“Football blows your entire schedule,” he said.

Chief Younce has become quite involved on campus in the five years since he arrived.

“He’s improved [the police department’s] professionalism and its recognition on campus,” Ranier said.

His activities include participation in the Chancellor’s Liaison Group, Student Senate meetings, Student Senate’s Nightwalk, and varied others, such as helping with the “Night Owls” meal at Fountain Dining Hall during exam week.

“He’s worked to cooperate with students and faculty and helped improve outreach to the campus community,” Ranier said, adding that he also aided in the implementation of the new equine unit of the police force.

“I’m glad he’s our police chief and I hope he sticks around,” Rainer said.

Life is good

A clicking, crunching noise drifts from the corner of his office and he points at a large cage by the window. A bright orange, yellow and green parrot ruffles its feathers.

Younce said its name is “Jolly Mon,” after a Jimmy Buffett song as he gets up and takes down a bright, multi-colored hat resembling a parrot’s head from the top of a cabinet.

The bird is a Sun Conure and was a Christmas gift from his wife four years ago.

“At 4:00 or 4:30 he starts fussing. He’ll wake up the building,” he laughed.

“It sounds kinda corny, but,” Younce prefaced as he prepares to divulge the best part of his job, “Helping people.”

An unfortunate part of the job, he says, is seeing people dead and dying, but he has neither fired his gun in the line of duty nor shot anyone. At times he has had to give first aid, consolation, and directions and has dealt with homicides, but that’s what it’s all about, Younce said.

“At the end of the day when you go home, you’ve helped someone.”

Even though he retired once, Younce never really retired. He’s too busy doing what he loves – being a police officer.

The 61-year-old is a grandfather of two now, but his age does not keep him from fulfilling his other passion – having fun.

“Life can really be a drag if you don’t have fun … if you don’t have fun, life’s awful,” Younce said.

And from the lines in his face and the crow’s feet at the corners of his pale blue eyes, it’s clear he’s had a few laughs along the way.