As Al Scott puts it, you might as well go ahead and get used to hearing about the race for Chatham County’s highest-ranking law enforcement officer.
“You’re going to spend a lot of time this year voting for sheriff,” Scott, the county commission chairman and local NAACP president, told a packed house at Greater Gaines Chapel AME Church on Thursday evening.
There, all five candidates for sheriff made their cases for office and took questions from the crowd at a forum hosted by the Savannah Branch NAACP’s political action committee ahead of the March 1 presidential primary, when the county’s voters will decide who replaces longtime Sheriff Al St Lawrence, who died in office in November. But, as Scott explained — only through St Lawrence’s term, which is over this year. Whoever wins the special election has to immediately qualify again to run in November if he or she wants the job for the next four years.
Right now, Sheriff Roy Harris, who was sworn in after St Lawrence’s Nov. 24 death, wants to keep his job. He’s being challenged by three retired sheriff’s office command staff members and a reserve deputy.
Harris, who was St Lawrence’s chief deputy, said he wants to expand the sheriff’s office’s efforts in fighting street crime in Savannah and continue working with area law enforcement agencies through the metro police department-led End Gun Violence: Step Forward initiative that targets gangs.
Retired Col. McArthur Holmes touted his experience as Chatham County’s jail administrator and a want to bolster credibility, increased community involvement with young people and a renewed focus on financial responsibility.
Retired Maj. Kim Middleton said she would try to bridge a gap between the past and the future of law enforcement and bring more community involvement to the sheriff’s office. And retired Col. John Wilcher said he wanted to improve conditions for employees of the department and ensure fair treatment for everyone, as well as restore the sheriff’s office to “what it used to be.”
Ken Williamson, a businessman who was a reserve deputy for the department, said he would be “crime’s worst nightmare” and also a “tax-reducing sheriff” who will find ways to fund technical education for inmates.
First orders of business
Asked about their first orders of business as sheriff, the candidates said these issues mattered most:
• Middleton — examining new medical care for the jail and training for employees as well as getting a national accreditation for the corrections bureau and a law enforcement accreditation for the street operations bureau.
• Williamson — hire a new jail administrator and boost training as well as find a way to impact children in the community.
• Wilcher — examine the command structure and hiring methods, look at programs for getting kids on the right track early and bettering courthouse security.
• Harris — continue operations currently in place, work to increase care for inmates who need mental health treatment, continue collaborative efforts with local law enforcement and the district attorney’s office in compiling a gang database.
• Holmes — completely reassess operations from top to bottom, work to fill vacancies, restore accreditation by the American Correctional Association and examine medical care.
Question about Tasers
A question from the audience that gained significant attention was an inquiry on how each candidate stood on use of Tasers in the jail. Middleton came out strongly against use of the stun guns.
“I never thought Tasers should have been used,” she said. “Tasers will be banned … inside the jail, and the deputies on the street will have to receive extreme training in order to carry one.”
Williamson said he would rather someone be subdued with a Taser than beaten with a nightstick, but that he would have to study the matter. Wilcher and Holmes both said they were involved in introducing Tasers to the jail in 2010 as quick, nonlethal weapons to get violent inmates under control. Wilcher said that the first year Tasers were brought in, injuries to deputies dropped by more than 100.
“That is an excellent tool to be used,” Wilcher said. “... I am for the Tasers, but people have got to understand how to use them and when to use them. And they are recorded.”
Harris said he pulled Tasers out the jail in January 2015 and is currently evaluating their use. He said that there are times when use of force is necessary — when inmates “are a danger to the other inmates and a danger to our staff.”
Holmes said Taser use has gotten out of hand.
“People started misusing them,” Holmes said. “They started abusing their use of the Taser themselves. That was because of a failure to train, a failure to direct, a failure to supervise.”
All candidates, to varying degrees, said they would invite more participation from the public in an oversight or review capacity. When it came to accountability, Holmes said “someone has to police the police,” and Harris pointed out that he had fired about 35 people for violations in the last year.
The candidates will meet again at 7 p.m. Monday in the Ogeechee Theater of the Student Union at Armstrong State University.