k here is some more for you........posted on FB the wife on one of the C/O's

[Angela]

Aebok Osborne Morton

2 hours ago ·

To all my local FB friends. Please read the article below written by Kim Cole concerning the corrections officers. As a wife of a current corrections officer, I am deeply concerned that the current sheriff has not given any thoughts or concerns about his officers inside the jail. My husband, along with everyone else in this facility, puts their lives in harms way to keep us safe. Many fights and assults have occurred that they have to physically break up and the thought of none of them being protected properly makes me very ill. Especially knowing it is preventable.

Talking Points: Protective Vest
by Kim Cole

Here’s a short lesson on what your corrections officers do:

Firstly, they are the front-line protection for you from incarcerated inmates. They are responsible for the security at the county jail, including cell checks, head counts of inmates, the welfare of those inmates, conducting perimeter checks of the Mason County Jail, among other responsibilities.
Correction deputies transport county inmates back-and-forth between the jail and to court, and for inmates receiving sentences of greater than one year, to prison. They pickup wanted persons who commit crimes in our area but flee to other parts of the state once those bad guys are found. Of the 57 police officers killed in the line of duty in 2012, 5 were corrections officers. Thus far in 2012, 4 make shift weapons have been recovered inside our jail, contraband seized and a cell phone found in a cell, which had been smuggled inside

These men and women put on a Sheriff’s Deputy uniform, strap on a gun, hop into a marked Sheriff’s Patrol vehicle and head out when they go on those transports. When working inside, they deal with criminals, some bad, some not so much. They have no protective vest wear, something that used to be provided. In fairness to the current sheriff, he did get the approval from the county board of commissioners to purchase six vests for transports, citing “they will just have to share a little sweat” as to why he did not seek approval for all Correctional Deputies.

Recently the sheriff mentioned in a public meeting that he had saved “over 400,000 dollars”. This money was budgeted money, allocated to him to do his job (part of which is protecting his people), but he returned it to the county’s general fund. I, nor did any of you who pay taxes, ever received a reimbursement check nor did we get our taxes reduced to reflect this savings and I’m okay with that. The Sheriff also said the costs of providing Correction Deputies with protective vests would be “around 22,000 dollars”. I think this is a little high, but okay. There are matching federal funds out there which would cover about half the costs it’s simply a matter of filling out the paperwork and looking into the availability of those federal funds.

These men and women, moms and dads, husbands and wives, sons and daughters will continue to come to work every day and do their jobs with or without protective vests. Some of them were assaulted last year and a couple so far this year by inmates. You don’t hear them complain because we are all professional who have taken an oath to protect you.

Look at the numbers and you decide.

[XLFD]

Hate to tell you, but a Sheriff's job is not to "care" about his deputies in the way you might want him to.  Enforcing the law, and serving the public comes first in Fiers' book.  According to him, he was for the debriefing, and just because he wasn't the first to seek it out, don't hold that against him.  To think that Jeff Fiers doesn't care about his deputies is pure foolishness.

[Marty Redman]

If your going to quote someone Phil masse you should get the full quote which includes "

Hate to tell you, but a Sheriff's job is not to "care" about his deputies in the way you might want him to. "  Other than that I don't follow your train of thought.  Someone cant defend that Fiers doesn't care about his deputies?  Wouldn't you defend Coal if someone said he didn't care about his deps.

[Cokeguy]

OK so I was kinda torn as to who to vote for since I know both Jeff and Kim . But in his response to low moral . Jeff in my opinion kinda stepped in it. He listed  the chain of command etc. all good stuff to know and what I took away from it was it is the fault of my SGT's that moral is low. I know this was an attack on SGT. Cole . But is throwing the SGT's ( his boots on the ground so to speak) under the "BUS" by pointing fingers really good for moral? I don't think so but thats just me.

[Marty Redman]

Disagreements between links of the chain of command are always bad for morale in the trenches.  Both candidates are pointing fingers at each other now as the problem link for the low morale.  Both may be right.

[Cokeguy]

I just think its odd that the whole dept. except 1 is backing Cole a SGT.  if its the SGT's who are to blame for low moral.

[TorchStalker]

I think the fact that the entire department is backing Cole is very telling. Jeff is not a good leader. Might be a nice guy but he is not a leader and his department is falling apart under him. Congrats to him for saving money but there is a lot more to the job than saving money.

[AQUAMAN]

You newbies all that have joined just now, in the last few desperate days before August 7th, I see ALL supporting Cole, funny thing, now isn't it? These your Teamster backup buddies Phil? Anyhow, if you look at the dictionary definitions of Care and Caress, I think you will know the dif between what X referred to earlier. Fiers cares, but doesn't necessarily caress his deputies, is that what these deputies want, to be coddled and caressed, cause if it is, that's not reality to the duties of Sheriff either, jmo.

[TorchStalker]

Geez, now I'm not Deb but I must be a Teamster? I'm so anti-union I'm almost offended! LOL

If he cared at all, he would at least check in with them after a shooting...he can't even manage that.