Benny Westcott
Cody McPherson has wanted to become a police officer as far back as he can remember.
“It’s just one of those thoughts I always had,” he said. “I just stuck with that throughout the years and never changed my mind.
The 24-year-old’s dream came true Aug. 8, the day he started at the Sweet Home Police Department. He’d applied elsewhere, too, but he knew he wanted to be where he knew he felt at home. And, as a 2016 Sweet Home High School grad, this was about as close as one could get.
“SHPD was my first choice for sure,” he said, “because I grew up here and my family lives here. So I thought it would be nice to be in the area.”
His pursuit of this eventual vocation began with a horrific family tragedy when he was two years old. He lost his 14-year-old aunt, Ashley Tucker, to an apparent accidental gunshot wound in 2002, and he never forgot the way law enforcement responded. He recalled “seeing how people in the community helped the family, and how emergency response people in the area such as the fire department and police responded and helped out.”
Now he hopes to extend his own helping hand. “Just being able to help the community I grew up in,” he said, “and help protect people like they did for us when I was younger, to return the favor.”
McPherson later began working toward his future at Sweet Home High School, where he enjoyed history and weightlifting. (That last passion has never left him; he partakes in powerlifting and strongman training, plays video games and shoots, hoping to one day participate in three-gun competitions.)
The son of James and Nicole McPherson, he grew up with two siblings: K.J., now 26, who works in town as an equipment operator with R&L Excavating; and Kendall, now 22, who lives in Oklahoma.
After high school, Cody attended Western University, graduating in 2021 with a degree in business with a focus on accounting. He was part of the school’s criminal justice and business and economics clubs.
“I’m kind of a math nerd,” he explained. “I liked math. So accounting, with working with numbers and stuff like that, kind of worked out. And it was a good career fallback plan.
“I figured accountants are always needed, and they have pretty steady jobs, so I figured it would be a safe bet.”
Interestingly, that scholastic maneuver originated as advice from a former neighbor, Sweet Home Police Captain Jason Ogden.
“He told me to get a fallback plan,” McPherson said, “which is why I got an accounting degree.”
He debated becoming an accountant, but law enforcement eventually won. Nevertheless, McPherson believed his degree would benefit him, anyway.
“Being used to paperwork and stuff like that is beneficial,” he said. “And I know there’s forensic accounting jobs that you can get eventually. So if I ever went that way, I could definitely use it in terms of that. But that would be a long way down the job, not right off the bat.”
Following in the vocational footsteps of his father, a technician at Halsey’s Georgia Pacific Paper Mill, McPherson briefly worked as a mill laborer after college, starting last November. Earlier this year, he moved to Oregon State Credit Union to become a centralized service representative.
“It was relevant to my degree,” he said. “It was kind of like a fallback plan if I didn’t get hired right away.”
During his brief tenure with the Sweet Home Police Department, McPherson’s already had a few eye-opening experiences.
“It’s been interesting,” he said. “It’s a little different from what you usually see from the outside. So, getting an inside perspective is pretty cool. I like it.”
He was surprised at how often officers respond to help people locked out of their vehicles and other “pretty simple things.” He was also exposed to how his colleagues were received around town, hardly the prevailing reception featured in media.
“Everybody always waves to the cops here,” he said. “I never realized that. But there’s so many people that try to talk to you and thank you and stuff like that in the area. That was kind of surprising, given the news and everything.”
So far, McPherson plans to stick around and explore what the future brings.
“My family’s here,” he said. “This is what I know. I’ve got friends who are still graduating and stuff like that. I like Oregon’s weather, the lake here, the vibe and the scenery of everything.
“I want to see how far I can take it and climb up in the ranks, and maybe try out a few temporary positions within the career field that Sweet Home offers.”
That may include a stint as a school resource officer.
“I think it would be fun to guide kids along the right path, and helping them out in a different way,” he explained. “You spend a very long time at school, so you can influence a lot of people that way.”
What he found most fulfilling about being a police officer, he said, was “going out there and seeing a different perspective on the city, being there as a problem-solver and helping out in various ways that you can.”