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Incumbent Sheriff Stacy Jarrard (right) addresses challenger Matt Cook during last week’s candidate forum as moderator Roger Smith (far left) glances at his notes.
NOTE: This article has been updated to reflect that the debate portion of the event was scheduled to start at 6:30 p.m., not 6 p.m., as originally reported.
Incumbent Lumpkin County Sheriff Stacy Jarrard and his opponent Matthew Cook traded barbs last Wednesday during a spirited debate at the local library.
The candidate meet-and-greet began at 6 p.m. The two candidates worked the room, pausing to greet friends and supporters.
Citizens continued to file into the meeting room until the debate portion began. Organizers had to keep wheeling additional rolling chairs to the center to accommodate the last-minute arrivals.
At 6:30 p.m., local Democratic Chair Roger Smith called the forum to order.
After a coin toss, Cook opted to go first.
“I appreciate the opportunity to talk to y'all tonight and to answer any of your questions,” he began.
Cook said he has been a servant for his entire professional career, beginning with the U.S. Navy. He said he has close to 15 years of law enforcement experience and 20 years of fire/medic experience between Gwinnett and Lumpkin Counties.
“I know how to motivate people I work with. And how you do that is by working with them, not above them. They are a part of what we do, and we should be out there with them,” Cook said.
“I want to bring that mentality to the Sheriff’s Office. I want them to enjoy their job, and I want that to reflect out to the community when they’re serving the community,” he added.
Jarrard said he started working in Lumpkin in 1988 as a dispatcher and worked his way up to the patrol division.
He said that he temporarily left and went to Dawson and Forsyth Counties “chasing money” and “the thrill of law enforcement,” until Sheriff Jimmy Berry personally invited him to come back to Lumpkin and be part of a larger departmental transformation.
“I then went from patrol to investigations to administrative to working as a school resource [officer],” Jarrard said, a move he said helped him “become human again” after a stint as a drug investigator made him feel like “everybody was the enemy.”
BIGGEST CHALLENGES
For the first question, Smith asked the candidates to name the biggest challenges facing the Sheriff’s Office.
“One of the biggest ones is manpower,” replied Cook. “We have a department right now that has 113 people. 74 are sworn, the rest are civilians working warrants, working as secretaries or working at the front desk. What my plan for the first 100 days is to bring back the majority of the people that have left.”
Cook claimed he has spoken with many of those officers.
“They didn’t say they wanted to come back for Matt Cook,” said Cook. “They said they wanted to come back for new leadership, that they were not going to work at the Sheriff’s Office any more the way it was.”
Cook said he also wants to improve employee morale at the Sheriff’s Office.
“I want to make it a place where people want to come to work,” he added.
When it was Jarrard’s turn to speak, he disputed the personnel numbers quoted by Cook.
“We have 98 employees at the Sheriff’s Office, and out of those 98 employees we have 57 sworn,” Jarrard countered.
Regarding turnover, he said outgoing officers he has debriefed indicated they were leaving because of pay, but he didn’t rule out the possibility that some left due to his personal leadership style.
“I will agree with that,” he said. “Because I have policies here at the Sheriff’s Office, and I keep the policies high with us here in this community. I want to keep high policies so we keep good employees here at the Sheriff’s Office.”
RETAINING EMPLOYEES
Smith asked the candidates to discuss the issue of employee retention in law enforcement and their specific plans to tackle officer shortages.
“We are blessed with what’s called the SPLOST [Special Purpose Local Option Sales Tax], which is coming up on this ballot in the next election. Please vote for the SPLOST, because that helps us,” Jarrard told the audience.
Jarrard said he is requesting nine additional officers from the Lumpkin County Board of Commissioners.
“With that nine more officers is going to come nine more vehicles, nine more uniforms, nine more guns … It will be between $500,000 and a million dollars depending on what the commissioners allow me to get in the budget,” he added. “I’m going to continue to try to grow the department and I’m going to continue to try to keep the budget as low as I possibly can. But I’m also going to need your help to get with the commissioners to get me nine employees, because this growth is coming and we need to take baby steps.”
Cook argued that the employees of the Sheriff’s Office need to be treated with greater respect in order for morale to improve. As an example he cited the department’s rules regarding the personal appearance of officers.
“This is not Mayberry anymore. Tattoos are not just for people in the Navy, or for sailors, or for people who have been in prison,” Cook said. “Beards were brought up. [Dahlonega Chief of Police] George Albert is one of the most professional people I know, and guess what? He has a beard. I have a beard. The beard is not what makes you professional,” he added.
Cook also recommended a move from paper citations to e-tickets to improve efficiency.
“There is no reason we should be writing tickets. We should have e-tickets in the car, printers in the car, and they should be on their way,” Cook added.
Jarrard circled back to directly address the issue of officer appearance later on in the debate.
“If you want to have a beard, I don’t care,” he said. “That’s your business … But when you’re in uniform with the Lumpkin County Sheriff’s Office, I want your appearance to look above and beyond and have respect for this agency.”
HELPING THE HOMELESS
When asked by Smith about the rise of homelessness in Georgia, Jarrard said it is not up to the sheriff whether the community gets a permanent homeless shelter.
“I could be one phone call away from being homeless myself,” he said. “I understand that, and my heart goes out to them. But you elected me to be the sheriff, you didn’t elect me to be the commissioner or the city council.”
Jarrard said the decision on whether or not Lumpkin County adds a homeless shelter is not his to make, but he also recalled a meeting in which the Gainesville Police Chief told him that a homeless shelter had increased crime in his city, and he strongly discouraged Lumpkin’s elected officials from following suit.
“The Christian in me says ‘Help them,’ but the sheriff in me is the one you call when you have a problem with someone trespassing on your land,” Jarrard told the crowd. “ … That’s why I took these elected officials down to meet with someone who has a homeless shelter. White County don’t. Dawson County don’t. As far as I know, Forsyth County don’t. Union County don’t. When I called those sheriffs, they said ’No way, no how.’ They wouldn’t even entertain it.”
When it was Cook’s turn, he said there are organizations like Community Helping Place in Lumpkin that are already working with homelessness.
“This is a hard problem. But it’s a problem that can be solved. I’ve never once said we needed a shelter,” Cook said. “… Homeless people are not the boogeyman … They’re the ones that are victimized because they can’t protect themselves. The Christian side of me will help them, and that will also help our community.”
CLOSING REMARKS
At the close of the forum, Smith gave each candidate five minutes to explain to voters why they should be elected sheriff in May.
Cook opted for a brief closing statement.
“I know that I’m not well known in this county, but I hope that you will vote for the person because of the job they can do, not because of their last name or who they’re related to, and not because they’ve just been there for 16 years,” he said.
Jarrard also began his closing remarks by appealing to the voters.
“I’ve given my life for this community: 36 years,” he said. “Yes, it’s actually been 15 years, three months and 27 days that I’ve been here as sheriff. And I have enjoyed being here for you. And I ask you for your vote to continue to be here for you.”
Jarrard then pivoted sharply to criticize what he perceives as unnecessary “hatred” in the campaign for sheriff.
“Matt, it doesn’t have to be this way,” Jarrard said.
Alluding to an earlier accusation from Cook that Jarrard had instructed him not to execute select arrest warrants for personal reasons, Jarrard demanded that Cook provide the names of anyone he had allegedly asked to be released.
“We can meet later or whatever you want to do with that … It has not happened,” Jarrard said of the alleged display of favoritism.
“I don’t even know who goes to jail until the next day. I get an e-mail every morning around 5:00 a.m. that tells me, and that’s when I know. Do I sometimes get a call during a traffic stop? 100 percent. But I tell them ‘You can deal with the officer and you can call me later.’ I do not get involved in that,” he added emphatically.
Cook jumped back in, even though his time to speak had technically ended. He offered the name of the street the woman lived on who he said had a felony charge for more than $15,000 for failing to pay for a new roof on her home.
“I went and picked her up and got a call from the sheriff saying ‘Do not take her to jail because she prayed for me when I had cancer,’” he said.
Cook said he reached out two weeks later because the woman still had an active warrant, and he said Jarrard told him ‘I’m still working on it.’”
“Two weeks a felony warrant was left out,” Cook told the audience.
He started to describe another story, but paused when he noticed Jarrard’s body language.
“You’re just going to shake your head?” Cook asked.
“100 percent, because this is deception,” Jarrard replied.
Cook said he would post his evidence online.
“If you’ll look at my Facebook page I will post these staff reports because I’ve had them pulled. And I’ll show you the text from the sheriff asking me to let them go,” he said.
Smith attempted to close out the forum, but Jarrard demanded a rebuttal.
“I’ve got a witness right here in the back,” Jarrard said as he pointed towards the back of the room where a small overflow crowd was standing.
“You called Doug Cochran first about the lady and said she had a medical condition and you felt she did not need to come to jail,” Jarrard told Cook as Major Cochran nodded his head in agreement.
“That woman has been arrested for this charge. The woman has went to jail and made bond for this charge. You called first, I did not call. You called that man right there first, who called me, and then we talked about it after that,” Jarrard said.
As the debate concluded, Smith asked for the audience’s input on the possibility of a similar forum being held for the county commission candidates. Most of the crowd responded positively, so Smith said he would look into the idea further.
In the meantime, the Lumpkin County Republican Party has a debate scheduled for all local candidates on Thursday, April 4 from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. at Parks and Rec, located at 365 Riley Road.