Up and Coming Weekly is a weekly publication in Fayetteville, NC and Fort Bragg, NC area offering local news, views, arts, entertainment and community event and business information.
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OCT 29 - NOV 4, 2014 UCW 7 ELECTION GUIDE 2014 ELECTION 2014: CUMBERLAND COUNTY SHERIFF Sheriff Earl "Moose" Butler For the 20 years that I have served as Sheriff, I have brought the val- ues of our community, my beliefs and innovation to the Cumberland County Sheriff 's Office. I brought new concepts, such as community policing, on-board cameras and computers in patrol vehicles, and other new ideas, while never forgetting the need to personally care for and be involved with our citizens. We have constantly upgraded our technology and techniques and maintained a Sheriff 's Office in which: (1) the community has reposed great trust and con- fidence and continues to do so; (2) crime prevention and control capabilities are continually expanded and strengthened; (3) essential operating policies and management procedures are properly formalized and promulgated; (4) fair and nondiscriminatory personnel practices are established and implemented; (5) inter- agency cooperation and coordination is fostered and effected; and (6) the provision and delivery of services to the community is constantly improving to the high- est level obtainable in light of the constraints of need, demand, budget, and resources. If the voters decide to allow me to serve another four year term, we will continue the implementation and expansion of our Commu- nity Oriented Policing for which we have received state and national recognition. Since 1997, we received the Governor 's Award for Com- munity Oriented Policing which has been a means of measuring the success of that crime prevention program, but the decline of crime in Cumberland County is a far better measure of its success. In addition, we will implement and continue implementation of our Problem Oriented Policing program. The POP program is an analytic method used by police to develop strategies that prevent and reduce crime, and we will continue its use. We will continue development and implementation of a crime labora- tory to serve all of the law enforcement agencies in Cumberland County. We will continue to implement our anti-organized crime programs. These include drug prevention and elim- ination programs as well as preventing and eliminating sites which have been shown to be those which attract and involve crime that is often hidden from the public, but which, underneath, fosters even other crimes, such as gambling, prostitution, and drug distribution. We will continue to deploy specialized units and spe- cialized programs, such as those dealing with property crimes. We have been recognized for the investigation and prevention of property crimes, and we intend to ex- pand those, for example, through the expansion of our anti-copper theft and precious metals thefts. We will continue to expand our mentoring and com- munity outreach programs. We have been and will seek to continue to be effective. I will continue to lead the Cumberland County Sheriff 's Office to National Accreditation. We became accredited in 1998, and since that time we have been accredited (with merit) by the Commission on the Accreditation of Law Enforcement Agencies The record of the Sheriff's Office is one of achievement and progress, and I ask the voters to re-elect me, and to allow me another four year term to continue to prove my dedication to their protection and progress. Charlie Baxley In my 36 years in law enforcement, I have learned that drug abuse and drug-trafficking are at the epicenter of violent crime, home invasions, and house-break ins. We simply must have a concerted effort, involving all law enforce- ment agencies in this county, to combat drugs and drug trafficking. The Sheriff 's office is the only agency with jurisdiction across the entire county, and that makes the sheriff 's office the key to success. Without the sheriff 's office on board, we cannot win this battle. First, we need to make two fundamental changes in the Sheriff 's office. We need to restructure the department so that we can put more boots on the ground. Without hiring more deputies, we can adjust work shifts and still double our public-safety patrols during peak crime periods throughout the county. We also need to restructure some of our resources being spent on administration so that those dollars can be used to put more deputies on patrol. This is not rocket science. All the assets are already in place. All we currently lack is the will and energy to get it done . . . at the top. Cumberland County is pretty close to being the house-break in capital of North Carolina. That's a disgrace. And the problem is countywide. Only the sheriff 's office has jurisdiction over the entire county. Once again, that makes the Sheriff 's office the key to success. Over my 36 years in law enforcement in Cumberland County, I have learned that frequent patrols deter house break ins — it's that simple. Deputies acting as chauffeurs or personal escorts do nothing to deter house-break in's. And an effective sheriff will use the staff he already has to cover this county with frequent deterrent patrols. When our streets and homes are finally safe again, we must turn our attention to gang violence. Gangs are poi- soning our youth, and we must address this issue with a vengeance. We cannot arrest our way out of the gang problem. The answer is not to hire more officers, build more jails or appoint more judges. Those are simply short term band-aids, but what we must reverse is the long-term problem of society producing more criminals and gang members. That means we need to organize ad- ditional mentoring programs for at-risk youth and sup- port our single-parent families, who are trying to raise their children on a limited budget. Fayetteville Urban Ministries and Great Oaks and the Boys & Girls Club are already achieving great things, but their resources are limit- ed. Effective law enforcement must address long-term trends, and one way to do this is to throw the support of the sheriff 's office behind volunteer mentor programs. Each school in Cumberland County al- ready has a deputy sheriff assigned to it. Why not use those deputies to implement mentoring programs within the school system, with the help of volunteers and PTA members? Deputies who carry guns and badges can also be teachers, as well as big brothers or big sisters.