Three veteran officers seek county sheriff's job

Three law-enforcement veterans are vying for the sheriff’s job in Flathead County.

Incumbent Sheriff Mike Meehan faces longtime former Undersheriff Chuck Curry and current Sheriff’s Sgt. Lance Norman in Tuesday’s Republican primary, which may decide the election because the primary winner goes into the November general election unopposed.

During his 3 1/2 years as sheriff, Meehan, 54, said he has committed to being a responsible steward of taxpayer money.

Achievements touted by Meehan’s administration include: streamlining the budget by rearranging schedules for deputies and the animal wardens and hiring a second jail nurse; using federal grant money to fund child safety programs such as the Children’s Advocacy Center, Internet Crimes Against Children and a Child Abduction Response Team as well as programs to help deputies better serve the community, such as a major crime scene unit and state-of-the-art equipment.

Meehan said he also implemented a work-release program in the jail and put warrants online, which he said saves deputies’ time and taxpayers money.

He has also had a part-time volunteer reserve deputy acting as a School Resource Officer in the Evergreen School for the past two and a half years.

Meehan said his administrative staff isn’t just sitting around. “If we’re short-shifted, they’re out on the road,” he said. He also said he “believes in personal growth and in promoting those people, because they are the future leaders in this office.”

Administrators also handle the duties previously held by the search-and-rescue coordinator.

“The Sheriff’s Office is very fluid,” Meehan said. “You’re changing with times, economic times, Supreme Court decisions... you’re always trying to make things better.”

Meehan was undersheriff before winning election to the sheriff’s job in 2006. He became undersheriff after Curry retired in 2005.

Curry wants to return the Sheriff’s Office to the way it was under longtime Sheriff Jim Dupont’s administration: Responsive to the wishes of the public and open, he said.

It also should be also fair, said Curry, 50. He said fairness is “one of the keys to some of the morale issues currently occurring at the Sheriff’s Office.”

During his 15-year stint as undersheriff (Dupont was sheriff), Curry said he was responsible for the day-to-day operation of the Sheriff’s Office, the jail, the juvenile detention center and the 911 dispatch center, as well as budget and coroner duties.

“I also did have just over 10 years in the patrol division,” said Curry, giving him insight into challenges deputies face in the field.

Curry currently is the chief flight paramedic for the ALERT helicopter.

Curry has proposed returning some of those in Sheriff’s Office administrative positions to new programs or to patrol duty.

He also said the salaried sheriff should not receive overtime compensation and, along with administrators, should work five-day weeks instead of the current four-day, 10-hour-per-day schedule.

If elected, he plans to reinstate some public safety programs, such as the marine division, the search-and-rescue coordinator position and have the Sheriff’s Office retake supervision of the Alcohol Enforcement Team, as well as expand community-based corrections programs. He proposes using new technology to monitor nonviolent offenders somewhere other than jail.

“I’m proven, fair and consistent as a leader and I really think the Sheriff’s Office needs a leader and not just a manager,” Curry said.

Experience on the front lines of law enforcement helps Norman, 41, understand what the community needs, he said.

The sergeant who has served with the Sheriff’s Office for more than 17 years is a Whitefish native and third-generation law officer who has listed improving morale at the Sheriff’s Office, cutting costs, increasing education and changing the medical marijuana law as his goals,.

“We need a strong leader in our office and in Flathead County,” he said.

He blamed current morale issues on “a lack of quality leadership at the top levels” and said, if elected, he plans to foster transparency within the administration and to the public, start a forum to give the public a voice in its law-enforcement agency, bring officers into the schools and educate the public on crime prevention.

He said he also would explore alternate methods of housing offenders, install lower drag-light bars on vehicles to increase fuel economy and utilize push bars to lessen damage caused by collisions with deer.

Amending the state medical marijuana law to allow only the active chemical in marijuana, THC, to be distributed in pill form also is on his agenda.

“Jim Dupont went from being a patrol officer, non-ranking, to sheriff, and look how he turned out,” Norman said. “I realize I’m not Jim Dupont, but you can go from being a non-administrator to an administrator overnight and be successful.”

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