He’s always up for a chat and enjoys walking the beat, so welcomes anyone to come up to him in the street and introduce themselves. While he’s still finding his feet after just a fortnight in the job, Sgt Boaden said he’s sees a lot of good things in the way the station already operates, and a few things he’d like to tweek.

Currently he’s in the throws of moving his family from their home in his last posting at Lake Cargelligo, where his wife Nicole (better known as Nicky), a school teacher, and their two youngest primary school-aged children are busy packing up. The couple also have four older children who have left home.

Sgt Boaden is no stranger to large families, having eight brothers and sisters himself. He was born in Nowra and raised on the Sunshine Coast where his family operated a market garden growing strawberries and beans.

He married ‘the copper’s daughter’ from Eumundi and the two set up a dairy farm milking 90 cows year-round, while finding time to produce four children in five years. He said he got used to the early starts (“it’s not as cold as here") and loved the lifestyle.

After 11 years, however, deregulation in the Queensland dairy industry rapidly reduced the number of dairy farmers from 2500 to 400. He was one of those going through the painful process of seeing the value stripped from their investment.

Seeking a new career, policing was rife through his in-laws, with Mrs Boaden’s aforementioned father in the police as well an uncle, brothers, sisters and cousins. Joining the Queensland Police required up to nine months of prerequisite study so instead he found himself enrolled in the Goulburn Police Academy before he’d even sold the farm.

“I was milking the cows on April 30, and started at the police academy four days later,” he said.

That was back in 2003, and after graduating his first posting was in Cabramatta on general duties. He readily admits it was a big eye-opener for a farmer who’d rarely been to the city.

After 14 months there he joined the Campbelltown Commuter Crime Unit (now the Police Transport Command), and he recalls his two years there as the most enjoyable time of his policing career (to date).

The job entailed a lot more than checking bus and train tickets, and keen observation led to his best arrest. While his colleague was checking the identity of commuter Sgt Boaden noticed the man was wearing several layers of clothes on a warm November day, and claimed to be carrying yet more clothes in a carrybag. When his justification didn’t ring true, Sgt Boaden said he read the man his rights and searched the bag, only to unearth a double-barrelled shotgun. 

The man was returning from an armed robbery, and ended up being convicted to eight years jail.

“And all because we checked a train ticket,” Sgt Boaden said.

It’s this proactive form of police work which appeals to him, and which he intends to pursue in Tenterfield. The family had passed through town on that first trip to Goulburn and, despite stopping over for only an hour and half, Mrs Bouden liked the feel of it, saying it’s ‘a really nice country town’.

“Maybe we could come here one day,” she asked.

“Not likely,” was the response.

His policing combined with her teaching career meant the two became ships that passed in the night, something neither of them wanted. So he took up a posting at Bellata, near Moree, as lock-up keeper, moving on to a similar position at Uralla after 5.5 years where he also sat the sergeant process.

In 2014 he became sergeant at Lake Cargelligo, and he finds the contrast between there and Tenterfield jarring. 

In Lake Cargelligo there are eight-foot fences around every property. And they’re not nice smooth Colorbond fences but corrugated iron ones, often topped with wire.

“I can’t get over the lack of fences here,” Sgt Bouden said.

“The town has a good community feel. It seems to be a trusting community.”

The couple had added too more children to the brood – in 2007 and 2010 – so now the offspring range in age from seven to 24. They are also grandparents to a seven-month-old baby girl.

After three years in Lake Cargelligo, classed a ‘special remote location’, Sgt Bouden had his choice of postings anywhere in the state but plumbed for Tenterfield. The posting brings him closer to family north of the border, and fulfills that 2003 wish of his wife’s to someday return here.

“Family is the most important thing in life,” he said.

“There’s a completely different feel here,” Sgt Boaden said.

“There’s are large element of trust, but complacency can result.”

He said there’s only so much the police can do, and crime prevention is really up to the individual.

“Is is fair or right? No, but it’s necessary,” he said.

“People just need to be aware. If you’re out in the backyard, maybe lock the front door, for instance.

“Take the keys out of the ignition when you park the car at night.”

While petty crime can be more of an annoyance, it can lead to bigger issues, Sgt Boaden said.

“When crime starts at a young age and they get away with it, it can become part of their makeup.”

He believes country policing is different to city policing, which can be more about getting the job done than interacting with people.

“I believe in giving people a warning,” he said.

“These are good, salt-of-the-earth people, and often a warning can be a more effective tool.”

Driver’s licences are more critical in rural areas when people don’t have public transport to fall back on, so Sgt Boaden said he takes a slightly more discretionary approach to minor driving offences, for instance. When offenders go too far, however, he’s often known to take them back to the station for booking before seeing them safely home, and then checking on them again the next day.

“Once they’ve sobered up or calmed down, they know they’ve done the wrong thing,” he said.

He finds that knocking on the door and asking if he can come in for a chat defuses a lot of tension, and builds better relationships.

Sgt Boaden said he’s also acutely aware of the traumatic effects of mental illness and its impact on families and loved ones, and sees that police have a role to play in these difficult situations.

“It’s not necessarily about enforcement, but as a last resort to provide assistance to families in need. We do have a heart and we do care.”

The Tenterfield Police Station is now fully staffed with the new sergeant along with seven constables and another three highway patrol officers attached to the station. As the only sergeant in the office, Sgt Boaden said he’s keen for the station to take on his traits of customer service and community-based policing, and caring about and understanding rural issues.