Nov. 3, the day after the election, was Sheriff-elect Rob Nou’s day off, and he was looking forward to heaving “a really big sigh of relief the whole campaign is over with and done, then gearing up to start working toward a smooth transition.”
His work will begin soon.
Nou, a Lopez Island sheriff’s deputy and former Oregon police chief and administrative sheriff’s sergeant, received 4,746 votes to Lead Detective Brent Johnson’s 2,410 in the nov. 2 election. These figures reflect the latest numbers available at press time.
Nou takes office Jan. 10. He and Sheriff Bill Cumming, who is retiring after six terms, will attend the annual meeting of the Washington Association of Sheriffs and Police Chiefs, Nov. 16-18 at Campbell’s Resort, Lake Chelan.
Cumming said Nou will help recruit a deputy to replace him on Lopez Island. As winter nears, Nou will participate in meetings with the town and county Department of Emergency Management. In the meantime, Nou will be looking for a new residence on San Juan Island.
Here’s what to expect when Nou takes office:
Nou said he will start a strategic planning process to develop a “roadmap to the future” for the next five years. “That needs to happen fairly quickly,” he said before the election. “One of the biggest things is trying to establish good lines of communication within the organization.” Nou said the five-year plan would be a yardstick by which to measure the department’s performance and would be “transparent.”
The message he got from voters is “they are concerned about how the Sheriff’s Office does business, the way we train and work with each other,” he said. Islanders are concerned about alcohol and drug abuse, and domestic violence. At a campaign event, one resident said there’s a perception that local drug problems are not adequately pursued, and Nou said, “Knowing (drugs are being sold) and proving it are two different things.” He said leads about drug problems should be addressed as they come in, and that the Sheriff’s Department can put a uniformed presence in neighborhoods where problems may exist.
During the campaign, Nou said he wants deputies and sergeants to work two shifts a month on an island other than their own during the slower months so they “would get to know the culture, the people, the flavor of policing on that island. It would improve communication in the department. We need to be confident that if called to an emergency on another island, we’d know where to go.”
Nou wants to bring deputies from all three islands together for training a couple of times a year. More training could be done on-island instead of on the mainland; he wants to identify what training skills the department has in house and wants improved training on case law and search and seizure. He said the department’s policy and procedures manual will be updated to reflect the latest legal standards.
Regarding the budget, Nou said the department could save money by changing how it does some things, like training. There are efficiencies that can be accomplished across the board; for example, leased vehicles arrive new and outfitted with the latest technology, without the investment of a new-car purchase. Nou wants the budget to be more accessible and understandable to employees and the public.
During the campaign, Nou said the sheriff must help policy makers understand that the Sheriff’s Department provides an essential service that the county must provide by law; the department cannot afford to lose sworn officers.
“I don’t know that it’s in the public’s best interest to cut law enforcement in favor of a non-essential service,” he said at the time. He said several officers are retiring soon and that should lower personnel costs.
About the new sheriff
Nou is 51 and has two sons. Nou has an associate’s degree in administration of justice from Los Angeles Valley College, and a bachelor’s degree from Oregon College of Education (now Western Oregon University). He graduated from the FBI National Academy, an elite program that not only gave him 10 weeks of advanced training but also connects him to “a great wealth of knowledge and ideas” in his classmates.
He served with the Yamhill County, Ore., Sheriff’s Department from 1981-2004; and as chief of police of Burns, Ore., 2004-08.
Nou said he moved to Lopez Island in 2008 because “life intervened.” He was going through a divorce, he had some health issues, he was tired of the harsh desert weather and isolation. He jumped right into island life, becoming a volunteer firefighter and EMT and a member of the Lopez Island Prevention Coalition. He provided input in the grant-writing process that led to a grant of $125,000 a year for five years for the coalition’s drug prevention programs.
“I love what I do on Lopez,” he said during the campaign. “I’ve made a deliberate effort to be more than a one-dimensional cop, and to get to know people on different levels.”
