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4 Set To Face Off For Sheriff

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By LISA A. DAVIS

The Tampa Tribune

Published: August 7, 2008

Updated:

NEW PORT RICHEY - Four years ago when Sheriff Bob White was running to hold onto the title of Pasco's top cop, he didn't have any Republican challengers to face in a primary election.

His opponent during the general election was Democrat Darlene Greene, once the agency's highest-ranking woman, but White beat her in a landslide victory.

As White tries to clinch a third term this year he will go head-to-head during the Aug. 26 primary with Republican Robert Sullivan, White's former head of the vice and narcotics unit until he retired in November. In the Democratic primary, two other challengers, Kim Bogart, a former sheriff's office captain, and Jeff Deremer, a senior Parole and Probation officer for the Department of Corrections, will compete for a spot on November's ballot in the general election.

Bobby Kinzy, 60, a retired TECO employee and Vietnam veteran who has no law enforcement experience, is running as a non-partisan candidate. He won't appear on either primary ballot.

White, 58, says the reason he wants to continue his job another term is simple:

"I'm not through. There's still a lot more to do."

During the November 2000 general election, White, then a sergeant with the state Division of Alcoholic Beverages and Tobacco, unseated Democrat Lee Cannon, a two-term sheriff, and took office in January 2001.

As sheriff, White considers among his greatest accomplishments what he describes as "the culture shift for 'citizens first.'"

He points to programs such as the successful Citizens' Academy, which introduces Pasco residents to all aspects of the sheriff's office during a several-week, free program, the Honorary Deputy Program, and partnerships like the Citizens' Service Unit where, after training, members go out and help deputies patrol roads and assist with non-law enforcement duties such as accidents and some neighborhood disputes.

"It makes them comfortable with the sheriff's office," White said of his community programs. "This sheriff's office belongs to them. It doesn't belong to Bob White."

The biggest challenge for the sheriff's office in the coming years, White said, is the economy. White has proposed an $85 million - down from his current $86 million budget - for the 2008-2009 fiscal year. He had been asked to cut $7 million from his request to help cover an anticipated $17 million shortfall in county revenue.

"Budget dollars are going to be a challenge," he said, adding he's always looking for cuts.

More Volunteerism

The agency is going to have to do more with less and White says they've going to rely on volunteerism more than ever. In fact, he said, he's already in the process of revamping volunteer programs including security patrols and crime watch programs that serve area subdivisions.

"Security patrols will take on the presence of the CSU in their community," White said. "We're going to have to do more of protecting ourselves."

He said he knows the agency needs more deputies on the street but the money isn't there to fund more deputies or the support staff to go along with them.

White said he thinks if the county commission wanted to prioritize public safety, members could find it in the budget to fund more deputies. Reorganizing the agency won't work, he said.

"You can assign them deputies and detectives to other areas but it's going to be the same. We still don't have enough," he said. "Moving people around is not a solution."

Differing Views

Sullivan, 46, has a vastly different view of what White considers successes and has been the most vocal candidate since he leaped into the election.

He has called the sheriff out publicly on several issues including the Honorary Deputy Program, saying it's a political tool to fund his campaign, something White has denied. Sullivan has pointed out that several of the honorary deputies have contributed to the White campaign, calling it the "Badges for Bucks" program. White says honorees are deserving because of their contributions to the community, not his campaign.

Sullivan also made a stir about White's administration wasting money by allowing staff, including civilians, to drive their agency vehicle to and from work or use it off-duty. White has since changed the policy prohibiting this but has said it was in the works long before Sullivan made waves .

Sullivan's reason for joining the race is he wants to continue serving Pasco after spending 25 years at the agency rising in rank from patrol deputy to unit commander.

"I think that I have the qualities that are required of the position which is an incredibly important position that requires the public's trust," he said.

Sullivan, of Brooksville, is the only candidate who lives outside the county. He moved to Hernando County years ago for a few reasons: to care for ailing relatives, to protect his family and not compromise his undercover identity when working in vice. His house is for sale and he plans to move to Pasco if elected, as required by law.

Sullivan said he thinks the biggest challenge the agency faces is knocking down crime that's surged with population growth.

"We're not fighting it sufficiently in this county," he said. "We need to refocus and redeploy to be assertive in our crime fighting."

He wants to run the agency using the assertive policing model made famous by Bill Bratton, the Los Angeles Police Department chief who is highly regarded in the law enforcement world for his crime-fighting methods.

"All assertive policing is, is getting back to the basics of policing," Sullivan said.

If elected, Sullivan will look at every position within the agency to determine whether it's directly fighting crime or augmenting that mission.

In an effort to combat budgetary problems, he will look at alternative funding sources and look at whether the sheriff's office duplicates any services the county already provides.

"We need to get creative," he said, vowing to be a good steward of taxpayers' money. "I am fiscally conservative."

Democratic Race

Democrats Kim Bogart, a former sheriff's office captain, and Jeff Deremer, once a liaison to the sheriff's office as a Probation and Parole officer, are vying for a spot on November's ballot along with the Republican winner and Kinzy.

Bogart, 56, began his law enforcement service as a patrol officer with the Tampa Police Department where he worked for more than five years. After a four-year absence from law enforcement, he was hired as a captain for the Pasco County Sheriff's Office where he worked for 16 years before being let go, along with most of Cannon's command staff, when White took office.

Until July 31 when he took a leave of absence to work on his campaign, he had been the executive director of the Florida Corrections Accreditation Commission for a decade. He also works as a part-time administrative deputy for the St. Lucie Sheriff's Office, working on accreditation issues and writing policy, and he also works as a national law enforcement consultant for Matrix Consulting Group.

He's been a Pasco resident for 22 years and considers himself well-vested in the community and says his experience, particularly in consulting, makes him the right candidate for the job.

"The consulting piece has been an incredible way to see different ways to do better what we do," he said. "The Pasco sheriff's office is broken, and it's going to take a tremendous amount of work to fix that."

Bogart said he'll reorganize the department and take a close look at specialized units and where deputies are deployed. He said there needs to be better collaboration between patrol deputies and those in specialized units.

The agency, he said, needs to focus on the crime-fighting mission. Areas that are crime infested need to be infiltrated, he said.

Two problems he sees are that there appears to be a lack of communication within the agency and not enough training. He plans to work on both by having an open-door policy and putting an emphasis on training, even sending deputies to outside training.

"Training is key to everything," he said. "You can't change the way you do your work without training. All your skills get improved with training. It's not just refresher either."

To combat fiscal restraints, Bogart, too, wants to look at alternatives to funding and continue looking at areas to cut. He wants to look into the possibility of consolidating services with the county. He also said he believes there's a disparity in salaries and he wants to correct that.

"Those things need to be looked at," he said. "I believe people need to be paid fairly but it needs to be proportionate."

'Time To Give Back'

At 38, Deremer is the youngest candidate in the race by more than a decade. But that's not a disadvantage, he says.

"Yes, I'm young. Yes, I've been working for the same agency for 15 years but I've been putting people in jail every day for 15 years."

He's practically homegrown, too, moving to Pasco as a child and graduating from Ridgewood High in 1988.

"This community kept me on track," he said. "It's time to give back."

Deremer said he thinks that because he's been on the streets working as a probation and parole officer and has worked closely with the sheriff's office for nearly eight years, he's in a better position to become a sheriff who understands the needs of the community and deputies.

"I differ from people who say the sheriff is a CEO of a company," he said. "No, the sheriff is there to protect you."

Deremer plans to protect citizens by getting back to the basics, too, by focusing on crime fighting.

"The only way to reduce crime rates is to put more deputies on the streets," he said. "That's it."

His goal will be to put 40 deputies on the street each year, even if that means reducing civilian jobs.

His ideas for funding new deputies and reducing the budgetary strain are numerous. He wants to convince the county to pass ordinances that fine DUI offenders and those convicted of felony violation of probation charges. The DUI ordinance, for example, would fine first-time offenders $250; second time $500 and third-time violators $1,000. Deremer proposes that all of the money would be funneled directly to the sheriff's office budget.

He also wants to reduce administrators' salaries and make raises the same across the board. He said he will encourage his command staff to give back to their agency by digging into their own pockets.

"We have to give back some of our own," he said, if the law allows. "I'd be willing to give back some of my salary, say $10,000."

He plans to bring in an independent certified public accountant as soon as he takes office to audit the agency and investigate where further cuts can be made.

Union Fight

One issue that was a common concern across party lines was the sheriff's relationship with the local Fraternal Order of Police unit.

Since the bargaining unit emerged two years ago, there has been a constant battle between union members and White. Deputies are working without a contract but both sides point to the other, placing blame.

Recently, nearly 200 unionized deputies in a secret ballot voted that they have no confidence in White.

Sullivan, Bogart and Deremer said that vote is a clear indicator of trouble at the sheriff's office.

"This recent vote of no-confidence tells quite a story," Bogart said.

White has a different take.

"It's all about the election," he said. "There were a thousand members of the sheriff's office that didn't vote. A lot of that was pushed and pressure was applied to get those deputies to vote."

Reporter Lisa A. Davis can be reached at (727) 815-1083 or ldavis@tampatrib.com.

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