While Lucas dreamed of entering law enforcement, it was dream deferred as her highest priority were her two children.

“Being a mom came first,” Lucas emphasized. “You have to sacrifice those opportunities, so I  worked at Aldi’s and had a great time doing that. I worked in customer service for 11 years. And then I eventually moved forward with my dream career.”

When her children were old enough, Lucas joined the Dane County Sheriff’s Office on January 22, 2018. In order to balance raising her children and her duties as a deputy, Lucas worked third shift.

“Some days, you sacrifice sleep and you run 24/7,” Lucas said. “Life doesn’t stop. Where my job as sergeant now may stop, my job as a mom picks up. Some days, it’s 24/7. And I just try to make sure that I have a consistency as to where I can sleep when my children are at school.”

After passing probation, which takes two years, Lucas became a deputy 2 assigned to the Dane County Jail.

“It was my first time working inside a jail or correctional facility,” Lucas said. “I completed the training for jail academy and law enforcement academy. Learning to communicate, gain those communication skills and polish up on communication skills was very important. Learning how to operate inside the jail was important. And then shortly after working in the City-County Building and the Public Safety Building, I worked in the part of the City-County Building that held part of the jail. I was eventually promoted to booking deputy. I worked and dealt with new, incoming arrests. I dealt with making sure that the arrestee coming in had the correct charges and all of the incoming paperwork from the incoming agencies was correct. So I dealt with a lot of new arrests.”

Self-discipline was important in the jail where everything and anything can be said.

“It is more than having thick skin,” Lucas. “Not only is it being professional, but you have to know who you are. Knowing who you are, no matter what is being said that may be inappropriate, it doesn’t rattle or shake you because you are very confident in who you are as a person.”

While Lucas had earned the rank of deputy 3 while serving in the jail, she demoted back to deputy 2 to serve in the community as a patrol officer.

“Working third shift patrol, every day is different,” Lucas said. “You don’t necessarily know what to expect. But it’s a lot of gaining knowledge, a lot of gaining experience and a lot of meeting individuals on their worse day. You meet people on their worst day, but you always make sure that you show that empathy and that respect when you are entering someone’s household or even when you do have to make that arrest. You just make sure that you handle yourself with professionalism.”

Lucas’ beat was outside the city of Madison.

“My assigned beat for third shift was Nor 2,” Lucas said. “But when I was called to aid and assist, I am back-up for Nor 1, northeast or southeast or any other major calls or municipalities. Sometimes you may find yourself outside of your assigned beat if you’re helping Wisconsin State Patrol or if you are helping someone from DeForest or you are assisting the city of Sun Prairie. My beat consisted of the Town of Burke, the Town of Sun Prairie and the Town of Medina. Encompassed inside of those areas is the city of Sun Prairie and the city of Marshall.”

After serving in the field, Lucas was promoted to sergeant and returned to the Dane County Jail.

“Sergeant is a job where you really coach, develop and close that training gap with your new incoming deputies, off-probation deputies and tenured deputies,” Lucas said. “We have multiple steps for training. There is training for new deputies to assist them in completing the jail training program, the Wisconsin law enforcement and the jail academy. They have two academies that they attend and then they come and do in-house training with the jail training program. All of those trainings are conducted by training staff that run the academy. I begin to see deputies as a sergeant when they are completing the jail training program. That’s when I begin to evaluate their performances, how well they are doing and being able to take on their tasks in training as far as being a deputy inside the Dane County Jail.”

Lucas’ duties as sergeant is a mix of administrative duties and hands-on work.

“You are definitely going around, checking-in with your deputies, observing their performance, making sure the performance is up-to-par, making sure they’re safe, you’re safe and people are doing things correctly,” Lucas emphasized. “You do observe. You do coach. And you do sometimes have to assist depending on the incident that is occurring and things that are taking place. And then I do have the administrative side where I do have to do certain paperwork and certain evaluations that must take place.”

One of the keys to Lucas’ success as a deputy and now as a sergeant is how she handles herself with other people, whether they are people out on the beat, fellow officers or residents of the jail.

“You respect everyone,” Lucas said. “In your profession, there is no reason to be disrespectful or disrespect the next person. You always want to be professional. You always want your contact — whether it is with the staff or the resident — to be professional, to be polite and be respectful. You want to treat people as you want to be treated if you were in their shoes. So if I were a deputy, this is how I would like to be treated by my supervisor. If I were a resident, this is how I would like to be treated. So you treat people the way you want to be treated regardless of what situation they are in, whether they are a deputy or they are a resident.”

For now, Lucas is content with being a sergeant at the jail while she stays focused on her children during their high school careers.

“My goal at this point is to complete what I call ‘The Last Dance’ with my daughter who is a senior in high school and to continually coach and raise my son who is a freshman in high school,” Lucas said. “I have a few more years with my teenagers before I can be free and fully focus on my career. My time after work and what I am doing now is a full plate. And it allows me the extra time to complete my Last Dance with my daughter. That’s what my goal is and what I am set on at this time.”