AFSCME Member Takes a Risk, Saves a Life
by Clyde Weiss | February 27, 2013
When it comes to public service, the job didn’t end with the shift for off-duty Minnesota State Patrol dispatcher Nicholas Carlson, a member of AFSCME Local 3142 (Council 5) who recently came to the rescue of an Alzheimer’s patient he found wandering down a road.
Carlson told TV station KARE-11 that he spotted the elderly man walking on the side of a road with a walker after 11 p.m. one night last month. The man, later identified as Clare Karsten, 88, a retired minister from New Brighton, had wandered off from an assisted living facility wearing only socks with no shoes, a light sweater and light slacks.
“It was 12 below zero out” at the time, recalled Carlson, a radio communications operator. He quickly turned his car around and headed back to the man. “He was like ‘Well, I was with a bunch of guys and they just left me here,’” Carlson told the TV interviewer. “I said, ‘Well, pretty cold outside. Maybe you should get in my vehicle and we will figure out where you live.’”
After contacting an on-duty dispatcher, Carlson waited for emergency personnel to arrive and transport Karsten to a nearby hospital, where he was treated.
Karsten’s son, Paul, praised Carlson’s willingness to take a chance and help a stranger. “I cannot tell you enough how good it felt to know that somebody made that effort, particularly in the middle of the night when you do not know who you are coming up on or you do not know what the circumstances are,” he told KARE-11. “I sometimes think we live in a pretty selfish society these days, but I find that people like him remind me that there are good people out there.”
AFSCME applauds the good work of Nicholas Carlson and all of our members who do their jobs faithfully, without expectations of public praise.
“Public service isn’t just a job; it’s a calling to make a real difference in our community,” says Council 5 Exec. Dir. Eliot Seide, also an AFSCME International vice president. “It’s a chance to truly help our neighbors, their families and strangers we’ve never met. Nick Carlson is an everyday hero; he’s part of what keeps our communities strong.”
