Page 5 - TPA Journal January February 2022

From the

Second Vice-President

Ben Urbanczyk

"If your actions inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more
and become more, you are a leader."
John Quincy Adams

My name is Ben Urbanczyk, and I am an After four years of college, and a semester of
Assistant Chief in the Texas Highway Patrol student teaching, I realized very quickly that
Division of the Texas Department of Public I had neither the patience nor the passion to
Safety. I have served the State of Texas for be a public-school teacher. So, I returned to
over 35 years, moving up the ranks with duty my comfort zone and the family’s farm. But
stations stretching from the Texas Panhandle things were different. Very different. Now,
to the Rio Grande Valley. I began my career instead of earning just enough money to fill
as a Trooper in Dalhart, Texas before up my car with gas (and maybe beer money),
promoting to Sergeant in Center, Texas and I was thrown headfirst into adulthood. I had
Hereford, Texas. My career then took me to to learn the business side of farming and try
Amarillo, Texas as a Lieutenant, and then to earn enough to raise a family. I was
Captain in Bryan/College Station. I was dependent on the weather, grain and cattle
promoted to Major and was assigned to prices, and the other multitudes of stresses
Weslaco, Texas and San Antonio, Texas, involved in trying to make a living off the
before assuming my current position as land.
Assistant Chief.
During this time, one of my best friends from
That’s a very black and white and formal High School joined DPS as a recruit in 1984.
introduction. So, who am I really? Simply When he completed the 18-week training, I
put, I am a farm boy from Panhandle, Texas helped him move to his first duty station in
who would have never even dreamed of Canadian, Texas. He told me crazy stories
ending up as a police officer. I was raised by about all that he learned in the Academy, and
my Grandparents (my Grandmother turns that it was such a wonderful experience, he
102 years old in June 2022, and just renewed would even do it all over again! During the
her driver license) on our family farm. It was next year after he became a Trooper, he
hard work from dawn to dusk, and as I got would call me, and I would go ride with him
older, I knew that I had to get out of there and as he patrolled his area. We chased
try and do something different with my life. speeders, arrested drunk drivers, and helped
My career path in college was to be a High motorists stranded on the highway. He was
School football coach and teach English. so different from the guy I knew in High

Jan.-Feb. 2022 www.texaspoliceassociation.com • (512) 458-3140 1