I was a public employee.

I wasn’t a “public servant” because servants get room and board along with other expenses paid for by their employer and not out of their own pockets, plus the word “servant”, as undefined as it is, makes a lot of people treat public employees like they were a beholding class and at their beck and call.

That said, I would also like to point out a great unknown, or a highly ignored problem is that the people in the leadership positions with whose directives public employees must comply are political beings not true professionals in the area they want to run.

As a schoolteacher, no matter where I taught, regardless of what expertise I might have had in any area, I could not make educational decisions that mattered when it came to fully educating my students. I was answerable to people who got their decision-making power from the elected officials who are their boss, School Boards.

This is common with all teachers.

Unless people have a kid in school, there is very little interest in school board elections. Provided nothing too scandalous happens, most people only know of the school district workings through their only real contact, the teacher, who becomes the target of any unhappiness as if they have any say in things.

This lack of interest hands the education of children over to people who, rather than coming with an informed educational plan have a political agenda with little to no experience in actual classroom teaching while ignoring the teachers who do and who know what would be best for the students sitting in their classrooms as opposed some blanket approaches that are required to be applied to all students regardless of reality.

And no matter how hare-brained a school board’s decision is, it must be followed by all employees who could get fired for insubordination real or imagined if they don’t.

While they do not have a say in who runs the school board and have to be ready to be bossed around by whomever the few interested voters decided should be their boss, whatever goes wrong as a result is laid on the parents’ only real school district contact, the classroom teacher who may very well disapprove of the same thing the parent does and who has to wait for the next largely ignored election hoping the few voters who show up at the polls will pick the right boss.

The day after School Board elections, there is either relief if things go well, or pessimism. Too often it is the latter because the teachers’ new boss is a one issue person with no grasp of the whole picture, yet teachers know they have no choice but to do as they are told, hoping next time things go right.

In a recent city election where I live, only 11% of the people voted. There were some Ward Councilor seats up for votes, but until there is a pothole at the end of your driveway, who really pays attention to city government unless they royally screw up?

People just let off year elections slide by because the positions people are running for are on the fringe of public interest.

This means teachers, and others, have to live with 100% of what the winner of the few votes decides is the way the district will go and has a huge influence over the future not only of all the children, but their parents and greater society who benefit from a well-educated population.

I wish the winning board member who ran for the seat did not do so just so she could change the eligibility rules for participation in sports so that her son, upon getting to high school, could get on the football team was a rarity, but just change the personal issue, and this is frighteningly common.

Boards will pick those who will implement their plans, regardless of merit, and they in turn will hire people most like themselves in background and ideology, thus creating a culture that will last until people pay attention and vote.

After 12 years of school where the kid really does not care about the mechanics of education but the personal whole school experience, and as parents really enjoy the cuteness of elementary school but can’t adjust when ‘his nibs” hits adolescence and becomes a whole new being, people move on and with them any interest in the real education of other people’s kids.

Outside the classroom, school district’s goals are often about promotion, authority, big money, and instant expertise.

Imagine working where people not in the industry decide who will run it, people who get the position only because they appealed to others not connected to the company except for reasons other than the purpose of it.

And then you get condemned because of the bad decisions made by those people.

The same goes with the sheriff’s department.

In Massachusetts a person can be sheriff without any law enforcement experience as the sheriff is more of an administrator with all that entails than an active-duty law enforcer. They can come from any profession. Their job is to run the facilities, make the schedules, and pay the bill.

The deputies, on the other hand, must go to an academy to be certifiable as law enforcement officers and do the actual hands-on work while the sheriff poses for pictures and issues statements.

While some do run for the right reasons, to improve the penal system, ridding it of what was once acceptable but is no longer as times changed while instituting programs that are more effective and relevant, to rehabilitate inmates, watch out for their well-being, and follow all laws pertaining to jails and who are in them, there are those who see the job as power, perhaps the first rung on what they hope will be fame, fortune, and political party recognition to start a climb in that area.

Sheriff elections, when paid attention to, are really about which political party gets someone in that chair to make sure jails are run according to their ideologies, good or bad. Like school board seats, this is also the first rung in what is intended by person and/or party to be a rising political career, and as with school board members and city council members, those who vote are acquainted with the candidate and so have involvement with the results of the election, while most people stay home because of six of one, half a dozen of the other thinking.

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The joke about running for dog catcher only works if people know such an election does not exist.

The deputies are trained in their field. They have to pass muster before they get the badge. They too may be the ones who get into that career for the right reasons, but every so many years, a politician steps up to run for sheriff, and not for the right reasons, and again, with little interest, perhaps the same as that given to school boards, slim percentages of the possible voters decide who it is the sheriff deputies will have to obey.

They have to watch the public, an extremely low number of them, decide who their boss will be, usually for political reasons or because they talked tough and scared enough people to get their votes.

If the sheriff is a forward thinking person who recognizes the need to get things more up to date with the facilities and how they are run, what programs should be instituted to rehabilitate and reduce recidivism and recognizes that some reasons for a person committing a crime can be more complicated than their just being a bad person and runs the jail accordingly, the deputy sheriffs will go along with this more positive approach willingly.

If the sheriff is one who really has no interest in changing the status quo because to keep it raises his or her visibility with politicians which could open doors, and will run their jails as centers of punishment switching the target according the political winds that could work in his favor, being in the position to do so, the deputies hired will be molded to fit, or continue to fit the type of deputy the sheriff needs to have for his purpose, not that of the inmates.

Non-conforming deputies in the second scenario will be weeded out, wrongfully most likely, while new hires will be those who, when interviewed, say the things the sheriff wants to hear. And, so, a chain of MINI-MEs is hired and the culture begins.

There is that tipping point, though, when it becomes obvious that the sheriff is not a good one, and that frustrating moment when the deputies learn if things are going to continue or if things will be improved.

Will they be allowed to do their jobs as they know they should be done, or will they be given orders and assignments which, no matter how wrong, must be followed or refusal merits loss of job.

Who will a small number of voters choose their careers depend on?

Another thing that must be considered.

In the majority of cases where no law enforcement experience is necessary, the sheriffs have not worked their way up the ranks proving them selves at each step, so, someone with an ideology and a political appeal to those who can benefit from it can take the job cold.

Political positions don’t need the burden of a track record.

The sheriff’s tenure is 6 years. Either good will begin to happen, or it will be more of the same old political abuse of a house of corrections solely for the political advantage of the person in charge who, rather than work for the system has the system work for him or her.

Most of the individuals and groups dealing with getting rid of obviously bad or too political sheriffs, give their attention to conditions of the inmates, as it should.

There is, however, little attention paid to the toll on deputy sheriffs and corrections officers who have no control over who their boss is or what kind of person with what ideologies he is, but most follow all directives and requirements or get the boot because a horrid minimum of the registered voters chose that person as their boss. The deputies will be the ones who receive any anger from whatever source that finds what they are doing and have to by directive without a choice has gone too far in their estimation.

Mr. Burns never releases the hounds. He always directs Smithers to do it.  

Our next election is in November 2022. That means candidates will start vying for various positions.

There are a lot of problems at county jails all over that need attention, and as they are in charge and as they are the administrators the sheriffs need to be held responsible.

Importantly, if for no other reason, especially as people have a decidedly negative attitudes of people in jail based mainly on assumptions that flavors their attitudes, freeing the deputies from an oppressive or incompetent boss is a good reason to pay attention and vote.

A sheriff does not make law, but enforces existing law. The position is not a political office. It is a neutral job because the law is the great equalizer. A sheriff candidate should be judged on what they have done and will do, not on their personal beliefs.

Consider also that some very fine people who would like to join the ranks may decide otherwise so as not to work with a bad sheriff.

This go-round let’s free the deputies. It may be something they are hoping for but, because of low turnout, have no faith in. Depending on who their boss is, speaking out might cost them the job, so they have to hope in silence that the public does them right this time.

Support law enforcement. Pay attention to who is running for sheriff.

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