This month, when people are walking around the Cass and Berrien County Fairs, enjoying an elephant ear or two, they may see a man in uniform riding around on a bike, talking with every person he gets a chance to.

That man will be State Trooper Jesse Binns, performing some of his new duties as community service trooper.

Binns will become the next community service trooper for Cass and Berrien County. He will fully take over the position July 30, though he has already begun helping with some of the duties. Much of his duties will be continuing the T.E.A.M program in public schools and creating presentations and programs having to do with public safety, from programs for senior citizens about how to avoid credit card scams to presentations to schools about what to do in an active shooter situation and fire safety workshops.

“It’s a wide-open position,” Binns said. “It’s actually really neat how much room there is to develop things.”

His first full week of work will be spent riding around and doing public relations work at the Cass County Fair in order to get to know people in the community and establish contacts. He will do the same thing later in the month at the Berrien County Fair.

Born and raised in Cassopolis, Binns feels this job is perfect for him due to the way it connects him to the Cass and Berrien communities.

“Even when I was working roads, when I wasn’t stopping cars or running the calls, I would stop at the fair, county meetings or whatever public event was going on,” he said. “It was kind of what I was doing anyways, so now to have a spot that’s dedicated to it, where it’s my job to go to these things and represent [the Michigan State Police] is one of those plusses that drew me into this job.”

Binns has been interested and involved in the Cass and Berrien communities long before he accepted his new position.

He has been a state trooper since 2012, and has been in emergency services since 2007. He was a 911 dispatcher for the Cass County Sheriff’s Office for five years. For several years he also served as an EMT for Edwardsburg Ambulance for several years. Currently, he is the assistant chief for the Central Cass Volunteer Fire Department.

Outside of police and emergency services work, he used to be the director the Cassopolis Main Street Committee. Now, he serves as a trustee on the Cassopolis Board of Education.

“I like to be involved. I can’t really say why,” Binns said. “It’s just who I am.”

Binns said that his connection and respect for the community will inform how he develops his duties and programs as community service trooper.

“I’m going to be getting out there and talking to people to see what they want,” he said. “I’ll be asking people what they want to see and if they had to come out to a class for a night, what would they want to learn. I don’t want to waste anybody’s time with something they aren’t interested in.”

No matter what kind of programs Binns, with the aid of the community, develops, he is excited to begin a new job that he is passionate about.

“I want to help people, and help them before it gets to the point where it’s a worst-case scenario,” Binns said. “Anything to keep me from getting that awful phone call in the middle of the night to take care of something that could have been prevented.”