Lincoln County Sheriff Steve Rushing spent last week in themountains of Colorado, but it wasn’t exactly a vacation.

Rushing was one of 28 first-term sheriffs who were chosen toattend the National Sheriffs’ Institute, which gave first-termoffice-holders the chance to put their heads together with othersfrom all over the country.

It was a week of classes on leadership and running a sheriff’sdepartment, and the contemporary challenges facing America’ssheriffs. Class attendees focused on the role of the sheriff inproviding effective leadership for the public good in such areas aspublic safety, criminal justice system policy, community relationsand organization effectiveness.

Rushing said just touching base with other people facing thesame challenges as he is was both encouraging and educational.

“That was the biggest thing, you get to meet other sheriffs, andyou realize they have the same problems that you have in otheragencies,” Rushing said. “There was a sheriff of a department with900 deputies and one with six deputies, and there’s a broad rangeof different ideas and ways to solve problems. There are severalthings I want to sit down and take a look at to see if they canhelp us.”

Rushing, who was elected as sergeant-at-arms for the class, saideven though his fellow sheriffs were in their first term, more thanhalf of the attendees had more than 20 years of lawenforcement.

“I met a lot of good friends,” he said. “And it was interestingto find out what a sheriff’s authority was in different states, andwhat they deal with and how they deal with it. Some of them dealwith unions, a few didn’t have jails – it was really interestingand informative.”

National Sheriffs’ Association Director of Operations FredWilson said Rushing was a positive addition to the class.

“Sheriff Rushing is a leader with a vision for the LincolnCounty Sheriff’s Office,” he said. “It is an honor to have SheriffRushing join the over 3,000 graduates of NSI since 1973.”

There were sheriffs from 17 different states, the closest toMississippi being Virginia, Oklahoma and Illinois.

Still, Rushing said, there were ties to home. One of the topofficers from Illinois has a daughter at Ole Miss and is quite afan himself.

While the trip, which was fully paid by the NSA and the NationalInstitute of Corrections, was mostly work, Rushing said there werea few chances for him and his classmates to see the sights ofColorado. He said there were even a few jokes about keeping theireyes open for Bigfoot.

“We never did find him, though,” Rushing said, laughing.

And there were other comical mishaps along the way to keep thetrip interesting.

A carry-on bag Rushing had on the way to Colorado lost its tagin transit on a small plane, and airline officials wouldn’t give itback at first since it wasn’t correctly tagged.

Then on the way home, Rushing’s suitcase took a detour of itsown.

“I got to Jackson and my big suitcase didn’t come off thecarousel,” Rushing recalled. “And they told me, ‘We’re sorry. Itgot swapped in Dallas and it’s in Chicago now.'”

But Rushing said his luggage was finally brought to his housenone the worse for its trip.

Rushing said he’s back in the office with a fresh outlook, readyto implement some new plans and see how they work.

“It’s good to be back to work and to take a lot of those ideasand put them to use,” he said.