PIEDMONT, S.D. – The two candidates running for Meade County Sheriff answered questions during a Meade County Republican Women’s forum held this week in Piedmont.
Pat West is challenging long-time sheriff Ron Merwin.
Both candidates acknowledged Meade County is growing fast and that means each have different ideas to face the challenge.
Merwin is currently being faced with a staff shortage and he says because Meade County is the only county in the state where the majority of citizens are serviced by the sheriff’s office, it becomes a challenge. On that note, he says they continue to do exceptional job with the resources they have.
West says he would work hard to find funding for both training and up-to-date equipment which will give the employees the tools they need to be successful. He wants the county to tap in to the number of federal grants available to them. They include COPS, or Community Oriented Policing Services, community policing grants and school resource officer grants.
West retired as a Supervisory Special Agent with the South Dakota Division of Criminal Investigation in 2017, but continues to work as a Drug Diversion/Prescription Fraud investigator with the D.C.I.
The Meade County Sheriff’s office handles between 14,000 and 15,000 calls annually, with a lot of those calls coming along the I-90 corridor, the area seeing the biggest growth in the county.
