TOLEDO, Ohio — Over the past year and a half, many people have left their jobs or re-worked their lives as priorities changed coming out of the pandemic.
But one employee at the Toledo Police Department is still going strong after almost 50 years.
Christine Brown works as a records clerk for Toledo police.
"Every day, mostly, I wait on the public. They come in and they want accident reports or crime reports, you know," Brown said.
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The 81-year-old has been with TPD since 1972. Despite a knee replacement and other somewhat serious health complications, Brown can't seem to find a reason to retire. In fact, she's been postponing her retirement since 2006.
"I keep telling them, 'I'm going to retire this year, I'm going to retire this year.' But I never get to the date, it just goes past," she said.
Brown is well known across the department, by everyone in the record department, officers around the city and even Toledo Police Chief George Kral. Some employees have bets going for how long she'll stick around.
During her career, Brown has completed incident reports manually on paper, through a typewriter and now on a computer.
Over the past two years, she has watched the challenges the department has faced, many of which relate back to the pandemic. Brown has also watched many friends rework their lives, leave their jobs or retire early.
And although she has more than enough reasons to stop working, she doesn't plan to quit anytime soon.
"I'm just not a sit-at-home (kind of person), so I just keep on working," Brown said. "I like the people, I like the job."
Her advice for others? Love what you do, and love who you do it with.