Jason Wickstrom

CALUMET TOWNSHIP — Michigan State Police First Lieutenant Jason Wickstrom has been promoted to post commander of the Calumet State Police Post.

Wickstrom, a 27-year veteran of the MSP, is a native of Calumet and a graduate of Calumet High School. He attended MTU in Houghton where he earned a B.S. degree in business administration. He also attended NMU where he earned a MS degree in Criminal Justice.

Wickstrom said that when he when he enlisted with the MSP in 1996, one of the MSP policies was that upon graduation from recruit school, a trooper was not permitted to be assigned to a post within 100 miles of his or her hometown.

“That has changed now,” he said, “but that was what it was like when you first got assigned as a trooper.”

Once a trooper completed the required probationary period, he said, a trooper was permitted to return whenever a vacancy occurred.

“I didn’t right away,” said Wickstrom. “I was a trooper at the Negaunee post.”

For three years, he was with the UPSET narcotics team, he said, before being promoted to the rank of sergeant at the MSP post in Iron River, in 2003.

In 2007, while he was at the Iron River post, the state’s budget compelled the MSP to undergo reduction-in-force. He was offered the choice of taking a demotion back to trooper and transferring to the Calumet post, or accept a lateral transfer to a post downstate.

Wickstrom discussed things with his wife, who is also an area native, he said. Their kids were young, and they decided to return to Calumet.

“I wound up trooping for a year,” he said, “which gave me a very good perspective.”

A sergeant position was then allocated for him at Calumet. He was again promoted to sergeant, in 2008, until August 2016, when the state set up the UPSET West drug team. He became a detective sergeant with that team, he said.

For the next six and-a-half years, he ran the day-to-day operations of the drug team, until the opportunity to become post commander at the Calumet Post presented itself, he said.

“There was a point in time when the end-game for my career was post commander at Calumet,” said Wickstrom.

His position with the drug team, however, caused him some hesitation, but his activity in the area was also a major consideration.

He has served on the Calumet-Laurium-Keweenaw Board of Education for 10 years, he said, and has worked with the Portage Health Foundation with drug team fundraising.

As a public figure in the community, which a post commander is, he said, he is provided with the opportunity to have additional positive effects in the community in general.

In his 27-year career, Wickstrom has previously held the ranks of trooper, detective trooper, sergeant, detective sergeant on the UPSET narcotics team, before his promotion to F/Lt.