FERRIDAY — As a child, living on Doty Road, Charles “Junior” Tarver dreamt of becoming a game warden.

Tarver worked for the Concordia Parish Police Jury and the Ferriday Police Department before ultimately becoming an enforcement officer in 1983 for the Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries and accomplishing his dream.

He moved to working as an undercover enforcement agent in 1989 before becoming the Region IV Enforcement director, where he oversaw seven parishes. He retired from LDWF in 2001.

Tarver resides in a small community near Monterey, where he has virtually no neighbors and could “literally hunt off the back porch.”

Though Tarver describes himself as retired, the Concordia Parish Police Jury named Tarver the Parish’s Homeland Security director last week, a position he feels suited to fill.

“My work history and training have prepared me to deal with emergency situations,” Tarver said. “I am committed to serving this parish and protecting people that live in the parish from disasters.”

Tarver said he is currently working on updating the Parish’s emergency equipment.

The Police Jury own three trailers, used as mobile command centers. Once up-to-date, the trailers will house radios, computers, cell-tower boosters and other emergency equipment.

“If we get in a bad situation, we are going to deploy the command centers where we need them in the parish,” Tarver said.

But Tarver won’t protect the parish by himself. He said he plans to use his connections with the Concordia Parish Sheriff’s Office and the Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries to help protect Parish residents.

As the summer sun beat down on his brow Tuesday, Tarver stood in front of a mobile command center and expressed concern about things that threaten to put him to work early. Among his concerns are a series of weak spots in the Mississippi River levee.

“As the levee gets older, some areas begin to sink,” he said. “If the river gets high enough, there is one area I am worried about near Fairview. It’s near the bottom of the parish.”

River water could slowly seep through the weak spots in the levee and flood the parish, Tarver said.

“The Army Corps of Engineers is working as hard as they can,” he explained. “They went out to fix it, but literally that night, it rained 5 inches and ruined what they had done. Fairview is the worst, but there are a few similar spots.”

In coming weeks, Tarver said he expects the river level to rise, but said he isn’t worried about the Parish law enforcement’s ability to work together to solve potential problems.

“If we have any kind of disaster, everything is going to come through me,” he said. “We are all going to work together to keep the parish safe.”