HUFFINGTON
08.19.12
TAMPA’S MAVERICK COP
on, it’s not going to be so much
fun for him there.”
DONALDSON’S PHRASE FOR this
is “disrupting social networks.” He
wants to replace a community of
men who are sad and broken and
drunk together, who share each
other’s complaints and failures and
low expectations, with a “fraternity” of improbable successes who
cheer each other on. (Although
there aren’t many women on the
streets of Tampa, Donaldson has
helped some of them, too.)
Donaldson sees himself as a
member of this fellowship. Although for his first 10 years in law
enforcement he had as much contempt for the homeless as anyone,
he has since discovered that he has
“more in common with them than
I would like to think.”
Growing up in Tampa, Donaldson was something of a loner; he
did not have a very large social
network, as he might say. He did
have a hero, however. When other
kids were going out for football
practice or studying for their SATs,
he was reading “Trump: The Art Of
The Deal” and “Trump: Surviving
at the Top.” He worshipped successful “problem solvers”, especially a certain real-estate kingpin
with a big mouth and a brash personality, and he got his own realestate license at the age of 18. But
by the time he’d turned 30, several
of his ventures had failed. He had a
wife and a young son and a drawer
full of bills, and although he’d
never been a great fan of rules and
procedures, he was clean-cut and
politically conservative and figured
he’d fit in with the culture of lawenforcement. So he gave up on his
dreams and became a cop.
For a dreamer, and especially
one who sees life as a series of
solvable problems, the daily work
of a beat cop offers few satisfactions. Every 12-hour-shift brings
the same mundane dramas: public
drunkenness, break-ins, domestic
Mark, Big
John and
Little John
after a jam
session
outside of
their camp.