Everett Police Officers Association, County Exec And Sheriff-Elect Debate Future Of Jail Via Facebook

November 17, 2019

Everett

Looks like policy debates by local elected officials may be moving to social media.

For those of you who don’t subscribe to Facebook there seems to be some unusual activity taking place by both elected officials and the Everett Police Officer’s Association when it comes to plans for the future of the Snohomish County Jail In downtown Everett, Washington. Here are postings via the social media giant this Saturday.

On Saturday at 1:59 PM this was posted on the Facebook page of Adam Fortney for Snohomish County Sheriff:

Hello everyone! Well I did not count on this being the first thing I would have to deal with as the Sheriff-elect and I’m not even in office yet!
Yes the rumor is true that the county executive Dave Somers is proposing to remove the jail from Sheriff management and move it to the executive’s office. The new Undersheriff Jeff Brand and I met with Mr. Somers on Friday and I appreciated that he met with us on short notice. I expressed to Mr. Somers my opposition to this move and we had a good conversation. Since I haven’t had even one conversation with the county executive prior to this meeting I think I was able to correct some pre-conceived notions he may have had about my plans for the jail. After the conversation he told me we had given him a lot to consider and that he would let us know soon on his direction. I told Mr. Somers that I would not go public with a detailed statement until I heard from him and he had a decision.
As of now Councilman Sam Low and Nate Nehring are OPPOSED to this move and support me 100%. While I will wait until Monday on a course of action if he continues down this road, emails to the county executive are appropriate over the weekend.
I can assure everyone if he chooses to move forward with this plan there will be very public opposition to it. For now I have to honor my word to the executive and give him a chance to reconsider this move.
Stay tuned…..this one could get really interesting!

On Saturday at 2:30 PM this was posted on the Facebook page of the Everett Police Officers Association Everett Police Officers Association Everett Police Officers Association:
OUTRAGEOUS!
The citizens voted overwhelmingly to replace Ty Trenary and elected Adam Fortney.
A plan to remove the jail from under the NEWLY elected Sheriff’s control before he takes office is appalling.
This a political move to undermine an elected official.
For Dave Somers to appoint one of Ty Trenary’s underlings to run the jail separate from the Sheriffs Dept is an offense to the tax payers of this county.
If the jail is need of correction and proper leadership/management this should have been done under Ty Trenary’s leadership. How many lawsuits under Trenary leadership?
Dave Somers should allow Sheriff Fortney to administer the jail and prove his ability to be successful.
If the jail fails under Somer’s plan l, who does Dave Somers blame then?
Please write or call Dave Somers to leave the jail under the newly elected Sheriff !
Thank you

On Saturday at 6:40 PM this was posted on the Facebook page of Dave Somers:

My office has been considering asking the County Council to put the jail back under the Executive office. It was this way for many years.
My interest is making sure that we recognize the jail is not only a detention facility, but also our largest mental health and substance abuse facility. Its is appropriate to punish law breakers, but also need to help folks to get on a path to a productive life.
Every time somebody dies in the jail, it is not only a tragic loss of life, but it also costs all our taxpayers millions of dollars.
We finally have our jail accredited as being one of the best in the country. Want to make sure we continue this progress. Not too many years ago we were under DOJ investigation and paying out millions in fines.
I am looking forward to working with Adam Fortney to make sure we are keeping our communities safe but also helping people out of addiction and back to a productive healthy life. That is my sole goal.

We’ll keep an eye out to see if this is the new way elected officials and public servants will now use to get their message out via social media as opposed to more traditional methods of communicating with the public.



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