We have reached the two-year mark of my first term as sheriff and by working together with many Bradley County residents, much good has been accomplished on behalf of all. I want to thank each member of the BCSO for their hard work and dedication as we continue to meet our mission of providing honest, fair, and professional law enforcement services to the citizens of Bradley County, while managing resources effectively to prevent and reduce crime.

Achieving measurable results is not always easy. I have ruffled some political feathers along the way, but anything worth achieving is worth the struggle and I appreciate the generous outpouring of support I and the BCSO regularly receive from Bradley County citizens.

In commemoration of my halfway mark, I thought it would be useful to briefly re-cap some of our most notable accomplishments over the last two years and let you know how these accomplishments will work toward building an even better BCSO for the future.

One of the most visible and effective accomplishments has been putting more deputies on the street patrolling and answering calls in our growing county. This was accomplished within the existing budget with no additional personnel. As a result, we have reduced crime in many significant areas because criminals are getting the message that the BCSO is proactively protecting people and property. Violent crimes are down, and theft and burglaries are down by 25 percent this year over last. For the first time in Bradley County history, our deputies can count on back-up, if needed, arriving within a few minutes; additionally, the overall average emergency response time has been reduced by two minutes since I took office. We are actually catching more criminals in the act because of our faster response time and increased presence, and those extra couple of minutes can mean the difference between life and death.

Upon taking office, I found much of the BCSO equipment and many of our vehicles to be out-dated and substandard. Almost all of our deputies were wearing bullet resistant vests that were threadbare and expired by as much as five years.  We had 33-plus patrol cars that exceeded 250,000 miles and were so old and rickety that they were breaking down constantly and could hardly pull a hill. One patrol car even had the engine fall out of it and catch fire while simply crossing a railroad track. On numerous occasions they would break down on calls or en route to calls.

Instead of ignoring the problem we met it head-on and through better management of resources we have upgraded all bullet-resistant vests and replaced over a dozen of our unsafe vehicles with modern, more fuel-efficient vehicles equipped with new technology and dash-mounted cameras to document crime and protect citizens. We still have at least nineteen cars on the road with over 250,000 miles showing on the odometer, but we have made progress and will continue to do so.

I inherited an operation where deputies’ salaries were, on average, 33 percent behind other regional law enforcement agencies of similar size and responsibility. But by better managing our resources and cutting top-heavy management, we have been able to increase patrol deputy starting pay from $24,000 per year to $31, 417, and corrections deputy starting pay from $24,000 per year to a little over $26,000. Although still behind the regional average, this at least puts our starting pay in the ballpark. This move was vital in order for us to continue attracting and retaining skilled, experienced employees. The short-term costs of competitive salaries will result in long-term benefits and savings to taxpayers as we reduce turnover, hiring and recruiting costs, re-training costs and re-equipping costs. Additionally, the BCSO will be able to do a better overall job of  protecting the public because of our increased ability to retain more experienced, knowledgeable and well-trained employees. This benefits everyone. We still have work to do, but progress has been made. Another area that needs to be addressed is the cost of family health insurance coverage for county employees. It is still too high, more than triple that of other regional law enforcement agencies.

I have always believed that open government is the best government and to this end, we have significantly improved open communications and information by launching one of the best law enforcement web-sites in the nation (www.bradleysheriff.com). Some of the features found on our web-site include press releases and mug shots, news stories, photo galleries, my weekly column, my twice-monthly radio program, and BCSOtv, where I communicate information about BCSO operations, policy and procedure. All this information is unfiltered and delivered directly to the public in a timely manner.

We recently instituted an “All Hands on Deck” program where BCSO top-ranking supervisors regularly go out in the community to meet and listen to people and learn how we can better serve citizens. It also affords an opportunity for management to get out in the field, backing up our deputies and keeping in touch with operational duties and needs.

We have formalized a fuel saving strategy without cutting services. We are also in the process of purchasing newer, more fuel-efficient cars with smaller engines for certain uses.

We have raised training standards across the board, resulting in better trained deputies and less potential liability for the county.

We have purchased and are utilizing an enhanced identification system to prevent unauthorized persons from obtaining BCSO badges and using them to impersonate law enforcement.

We have begun using “plain language” in radio transmissions to put the BCSO in compliance with National Homeland Security and National Incident Management System standards and to enhance our ability to obtain future Homeland Security grant funding.

There are many more accomplishments I want to share with you, but I am out of space for this week. I will continue this Progress Report next week.