Submitted by: Nick Newman, UDOT – February 2015.

For Jackson Boss, a District Permits Officer for the Utah Department of Transportation’s Region Two, it was just another morning. He ran “blue stakes” tickets, and chose to get some coffee at Sugarhouse Coffee. But what he found there illustrates how he lives the core values of integrity and public responsiveness, on and off the clock.

As Jackson left the coffee shop, he noticed a wallet in the parking lot, next to his car. He hadn’t noticed it before and originally wondered if the wallet was a prank. But what he found there wasn’t just a fellow motorist’s ID card. As he looked to see if he could identify the owner, he noticed much more was in her wallet.

“It looked like she had her whole life in there — cash, school ID, important documents,” Boss said. “I’ve lost my fair share of items, and it’s not fun worrying about where you left them or where they went.”

Instead of leaving the wallet at the coffee shop’s lost and found, he chose to bring it to the owner — a Makali’i Brown of Sandy, Utah.

Makali’i described her situation, after posting on Facebook about the event:

“After looking, I was ready to face how much trouble I was in. But I was surprised when my mom handed me the wallet and told me a kind, complete stranger had picked it up and drove all the way from Sugarhouse out of the goodness of his heart. I was surprised that it was completely intact and untampered with.”

Jackson shrugged off any congratulations when he was told Makali’i wanted to thank him. To him, there was never any doubt what to do.

“I think that you need to be the change you want to see in the world, whether it’s returning a wallet or anything else,” Boss said.

Coffee and kindness from a UDOT employee – February 2015