Elected through Terror

Untitled Part 10

I will write and share more about the Rajneesh and their crimes against citizens, in a little while, however, I want to give a little background information on me and some of the issues I saw while running for office, what I perceived after I was elected and how we addressed those concerns. It gives a bit more understanding in the approach we took in dealing with Rajneesh issues.

Many of you are in law enforcement so much of this primary information will be old hat - however, if you care to comment I would love to hear from you.

I was elected in early November 1984 however; I was not to take office until January 7th, 1985. The current Sheriff, who I had defeated, allowed me to come into the office and get oriented.

He allowed me to go wherever I wanted or felt I needed to go within the agency without restriction, even taking time to go over some of his concerns he thought I would have to address when I was sworn into the office.

I really appreciated that; he could have just as well told me no. As I said earlier, he was a good guy, but not prepared to handle the many aspects of the position.

I had been a City Police Officer and I was good (if I do say so myself) at most aspects of that job. I worked with a good team of men and women and we function pretty well.

But police departments are focused on enforcing the law. The officers issue tickets, become mediators in family and other disputes, make arrests and investigate crimes.

I was in charge of Crime Prevention for the department starting it from scratch and building a strong volunteer organization. It was one of the reasons so many people knew me.

I had always been aware of public relations and the need to relate to the citizens. I spoke at a number of meetings and I was frequently in the schools talking to students about law enforcement, listening to them and talking about how we worked.

I talked to kindergarten classes up to and including high school classes - often on my own time.

I also spoke, for years, on career days and in classes where the teacher(s) was helping the students explore different occupations, or where they wanted a police officer's perspective of the constitution and the responsibility of the citizens.

I had some administrative responsibilities, but mainly my position of Commander was more supervisory than administrative.

I had taken many classes in both the private and law enforcement section on management and laws concerning employees as well as criminal law. I subscribed to management periodicals to help me improve my performance as a Commander.

Those contacts I made over the years as well as the classes I took, many on my own time, helped me perfect my professional abilities and when the opportunity presented itself, I felt ready for the Office of Sheriff.

In many ways I was; I knew the criminal law and the application of it as a police officer. I knew the responsibility of a manager and leader and was prepared to take that task on.

But a Police Department is a lot different than a Sheriff's Office. While I knew what the responsibilities of a Sheriff was I had a lot to learn about the application of those responsibilities.

While the Sheriff's Offices do the same job as the City's Police Departments, we have many additional duties: Service of civil papers - several thousand a year and you HAD to have a good civil deputy (fortunately we did - we later had another clerk cross trained to take over on her vacations, etc.)

The JAIL, Animal Control, dispatching, contracts with federal and state governments to have extra patrol on the county's forest and BLM lands as well as on the water ways.

Our patrol area was 2396 square miles as compared to the seven square miles in the city.

We were responsible for Search and Rescue, and while we didn't experience a lot of calls, we had to respond and deal with them and we didn't have a team.

In the Police Department I had the responsibility of running a few programs and a shift. I, and two other Commanders, advised the Chief who worked with the City Manager in the operation of the agency.

While the Police Chief was indeed head of the department the City Manager had to approve of all decisions made by him. The Chief was given a lot of free reign but, in the end he wasn't the final authority.

In the city the City council had direct authority over the City Manager and while they were not allowed to have direct disciplinary contact with the employees, they could direct the City Manager to take disciplinary or discharge action.

There were a lot of levels between myself and the finalization of policies and procedures, personnel issues, etc. It is much different for an elected Sheriff.