Rick Staly, Flagler County Sheriff Candidate: The Live Interview

Four years ago, the sheriff’s race drew eight candidates–six Republicans and two Democrats. Jones, who retired in 2014 as a sergeant after a three-decade career at the Flagler County Sheriff’s Office, defeated Jim Manfre in the primary. Staly defeated Jones in the general election, taking 54 percent of the vote in a three-way race. Jones got 39 percent of the vote, with an independent getting 7 percent. So this is a rematch between Jones and Staly.

It has been a lopsided race: Jones’s $4,000 in campaign contributions makes him the second-lowest funded candidate in any of the countywide races with the exception of one candidate for school board, who raised less than $2,000 (and lost). Staly has raised $111,000 so far, or $60,000 more than the next-best funded candidate in countywide races (County Commissioner Dave Sullivan, who raised nearly $50,000 in his winning bid for re-election, half of it his own money.)

The sheriff was paid $133,989 in 2020, a salary set by state law but paid out of local dollars.

FlaglerLive submitted 15 identical questions to the two candidates, who replied in writing, with the understanding that some follow-up questions may be asked, and that all exchanges would be on the record. Follow-up questions, when necessary, appear in italics. The Live Interview’s aim is to elicit as much candor and transparency as possible. We have asked candidates to refrain from making campaign speeches or make lists of accomplishments. We have also asked candidates to reasonably document any claim or accusation. Undocumented claims are edited out. Answers are also edited for length, redundancy, relevance and, where possible, accuracy. If a candidate does not answer a question or appears to be evading a question, that’s noted.

But it’s ultimately up to the reader to judge the quality and sincerity of a candidate’s answers.

The Questions in Summary: Quick Links

• Basics
• Strongest arguments
• Character
• Grading, achievements and flaws
• Priorities
• Crime
• Public perception of cops
• Use of force
• Officer-involved shootings
• Black lives
• Police funding
• Deputy staffing
• Policing Palm Coast
• Succession
• Lessons learned
• Background check

CANDIDATE: The Basics:

Place and Date of Birth:
Current job:
Net worth:
Party Affiliation:
Website:




1.To the sheriff: what is your strongest argument for a second term? To the challenger: what is your strongest argument against incumbency?

Sheriff:  47% crime reduction since election in 2017.  Restoring citizen trust and community pride in their Flagler County Sheriff’s Office.  Receiving national, statewide, and regional recognition for professional excellence as a Sheriff’s Office with four types of accreditation, technology, traffic safety, addressing domestic violence, best practices in the use of force, and being a very attractive place to work. I have stabilized the agency and implemented a new culture of Guardianship community policing. I now want to build on these first term successes.

2. Describe your character and temperament, and what people you’ve worked with—or citizens you’ve interacted with—would say are your most serious personal flaws, in so far as how they affect your job. What do you do to address those flaws?

Thoughtful, deliberative, objective, consistent, fair, kind, compassionate, patient and dedicated to our community. My style is to focus on getting the job done and continually encourage and support our team.

I’m a cop and not a politician.  Despite my public image I am, at heart, an introvert. I am not the most extroverted individual like some elected officials are.  However, I make myself be an extrovert, which over time has become easier. I think people value leaders who are committed to integrity and excellence and speak it like they see it, which is who I am, but at times can be too outspoken.

By any objective standard the last four years have established you as possibly the shrewdest if not the most effective politician in the county–if popularity, budgetary successes and the degree to which your approbation or support is curried by other politicians are any measure. Is calling yourself “not a politician” really tenable? And given previous sheriffs’ stumbles in that regard, does it not take a great deal of adept politicking to navigate the agency through county and city politics? Why the resistance to the label? Along the same lines of politicking, your savviness with public relations sometimes has you in your own agency’s releases and agency pictures claiming a limelight perhaps better trained on your rank and file: is publicity your Achille’s heel?

I am an effective and experienced law enforcement administrator and understand that being successful is about relationships and making the right decisions for the right reasons for both FCSO employees and the community. I have previously worked for five prior Sheriffs in top executive level positions. Four of those Sheriffs were successful. You learn from those that were successful and those that were not on how to handle the myriad of responsibilities and demands on a Sheriff to create your own successful style, which I have done. While I must be elected under Florida law (the politician side) I make decisions on what is best for the agency and the community and not because I fear not being re-elected or because I need a pay check. This allows me to be very independent and do the right thing instead of making political or emotional decisions, which is the downfall of many elected officials.

As to the second part of your questions, I am the face and the chief spokesperson for the Agency. The public expects to hear and see their Sheriff.I am not a desk-jockey Sheriff. I recognize our employees all the time through awards ceremonies and publicly in news releases or in-person with the news media. Many times the media has interviewed FCSO employees and written stories, including FlaglerLive. A frequent comment I receive is “We’ve never seen a Sheriff so involved with the community like you.”The team deserves all the credit. As Sheriff, I am their spokesman.

3. First, give the current sheriff a grade (A, B, C, etc.) with some explanation. Second, name the three strongest achievements of the last four years (even if you are the challenger), and name the three most serious flaws, failures or missed opportunities in the agency in the last four years.

I don’t give myself grades but I do look at what has been accomplished and what FCSO has become under my leadership with pride. But, I do look at what others say in objective assessments.  The City of Palm Coast does an annual survey and the latest results are 95% of citizens say they feel safe in their neighborhood and 88% feel we do a good job.  We have four professional accreditations, two obtained while I was either Undersheriff or Sheriff and the others have been maintained, and there’s only one way you obtain and maintain accreditation and that’s by adhering to the best professional law enforcement practices.

The three strongest achievements:  1) A 47% crime reduction – the lowest crime rate in Flagler County in 25 years; 2) Implementing District and Guardianship policing with the community; 3) Rebuilding a demoralized team and an agency that was not well-respected by the community and peer law enforcement agencies to seeing the enthusiasm and pride our team has in who they are, what they do, and who they serve with a community that now takes pride in FCSO and now being a regionally recognized leader in providing law enforcement services and crime reduction. As a result, In December 2019 the Daytona-News Journal recognized FCSO as one of the 10 Best Places to work in Volusia-Flagler County’s and the only government agency recognized. If I had to give myself a grade, I would rank myself an A- based on our accomplishments but knowing you can always improve crime reduction and services to the community.

There are two major challenges which predated me but I have had to invest an enormous amount of leadership and time in fixing. First, I had to order the abandonment of the Operations Center a year and a half into my term for the safety of our employees. This resulted in leading an organization that has no physical home and a very decentralized organization resulting in losses in time and efficiency.

Secondly, I inherited a very serious decades long staffing deficit that was hindering our ability to serve our community. Working with the county commission and Palm Coast city council we had begun to make progress but then the pandemic came. In hindsight the staffing study I ordered should have been ordered in my first year.

Third, building a stronger relationship with the local branch of the NAACP.  I have spent some time with their leadership and attended some events to work on building a good working relationship but I believe this relationship could be stronger and better.

Regarding the operations center: you evacuated the moldy one in June 2018. We are now two years and four months from that date. The County Commission first voted to build a new operations center in April 2019. But here we are, ground unbroken 18 months later–a time span that would normally have accounted for the construction time of a new building. Covid has little to do with it: the virus hasn’t stopped residential construction from breaking records in Palm Coast. You were sharply critical of the previous administration regarding its foot-dragging in resolving your exile from the old operations center. You’ve been uncharacteristically quiet about the current administration’s foot-dragging, though it’s entirely its responsibility to get your agency into a new building. Why the silence, why the tolerance for the delays?

Actually Covid-19 did slow down the County’s selection process for the architect and the construction company as County resources were diverted. The process is tightly regulated by state law to ensure fairness and the best pricing for the taxpayer and is usually done in a public meeting by county staff so all bidders and interested parties can be present. It was at my suggestion and request the County used Zoom meetings to finalize the selection process. There have been delays in the County and vendors agreeing on contract language. During this time the county split the architectural services contract in to two phases so that preliminary drawings could be started while the master contract was being ironed out. Final site selection had to be worked out by the County so engineering, preliminary drawings, etc. could be started without wasting taxpayer money.

While this was going on the County built a temporary evidence/CSI building for use by FCSO that will later be a joint FCSO/Flagler County Fire Rescue training facility. While my team and I wish we were much further along we all recognize that to do this project right, which I demanded, takes time and I do see significant movement underway. The previous County administrator tried to hide and cover-up for their mistakes and bad decisions and did not want to take accountability for them or the illnesses they caused my employees and that is why I had to be vocal. The current County Administrator and County Commission has recognized the issues, conducted a space needs study, selected the architect and construction company and is now in the design phase. You don’t want to start clearing land until you know where retention ponds, parking lots and the building will actually be situated. To do so early would be a waste of taxpayer money and likely unnecessarily destroy areas of the environment that would be unnecessary. Once the design phase is done, which is always the slowest part (even in building a home), you will see visible progress on the site. Do I wish this County project was further along? Absolutely! But I do understand government takes longer to do things because of more internal regulations than private business has and the County is now making significant progress so there is no reason to be vocal.

4. What priorities can we look forward to that will visibly and effectively make a difference in public safety in our communities and public trust in our deputies?

Public trust is essential to public safety.  I would ask citizens to visit our Honor to Serve webpage which shows that your FCSO had implemented all of the reforms recommended at both the national level and state level early in my first term and long before the calls for police reform across the country. This demonstrates our strong commitment to citizen trust and engagement, transparency, and accountability.

In a second term, I am spearheading a regional initiative with the Sheriff’s of Putnam, Volusia and St. Johns counties,  along with the Daytona Beach Police Department, to ensure that our region and community never looks inviting to certain criminal elements (I can’t go into detail here without potentially compromising active investigations). In addition, we will continue to improve on and build organizational depth in the new initiatives implemented during my first term and in our Community Policing Division. Community involvement, crime reduction, guardianship policing, technology, transparency, inmate rehabilitation and youth programs will remain top priorities and a hallmark of my tenure.

But you opened the door to the question: to float what sounds like an important public safety initiative but say you can’t go into detail is the old Nixonian ploy of saying right around election time that he had a secret plan to end the Vietnam War, when of course he had nothing (the war escalated in his first term), though it helped win him the election. Since policing is very much of a public concern, and secret local policing is not a norm in an open society, surely you can give us a better idea of the tri-county initiative you are referring to, if it’s that consequential, before we hear of it in one of those camera-rich news conferences with other sheriffs and the state attorney at your side. 

Sorry, but I cannot and will not compromise an active investigation. I can tell you that it includes a federal partner and when we reveal this operation, you will want to attend the press conference to let your readers know. I can’t speak for the late President Nixon but in my case there is a plan, there is an ongoing operation but it will take time to bring it to conclusion.Covid-19 did slow down this operation to ensure the safety of all employees involved. As always, we will make sure that the public and news media know the facts and results when the investigation is complete.

5. In the ongoing French election every candidate claims crime is a problem, every candidate is making crime an issue, yet crime is unquestionably down. We get some of the same vibes in our pages: though crime is at a historic low, responses from readers tend to reflect a fear of rising crime and insecurity. Surely media reports are partly to blame, though no differently than sheriff’s releases highlighting this or that arrest. So looking beyond these reports, to what do you attribute that seeming insecurity or sense of anxiety?

I believe an informed and engaged community is a safer community.  As a result of informing the community of what is occurring and asking for their help to solve crimes using “see something, say something,” it does lead to a dichotomy between fact and perception. It is statistically proven by FDLE Uniform Crime Reporting that crime is down 47% in Flagler County since I have been Sheriff, proving the new vision and various initiatives I have implemented are working. The City of Palm Coast’s annual survey resulted in 95% of citizens feeling safe in their neighborhood.  For Guardianship community policing to be successful it requires the engagement of the community. We have done a great job engaging the community but it likely helped create this perception. It is also likely that media, local, state and national, contribute to this insecurity by focusing on crime and, lately, national unrest, without balancing the positives we do in the  media coverage.

6. Law enforcement officers’ treatment of citizens clearly impacts public opinion of law enforcement, whether by word of mouth, cell phone clips, body cam clips, and how those who’ve had interactions with police speak of those interactions with friends and family. How does that opinion play into your management of your ranks?

Our culture is to treat citizens the way we would want to be treated in the same situation.  Our recruitment, hiring, training, agency culture, policies, technology, supervision, and accountability mechanisms all support ensuring that citizens are treated professionally and respectfully.  We train significantly in de-escalation techniques that have been successful many times. We wear body cameras and are phasing in patrol car cameras to complement the body cameras. We are a transparent Agency publishing an Agency annual report, and annual reports on Use of Force; Biased Based Policing; and, even our policy on the Use of Defensive Tactics is on our website.  In addition, we are an accredited law enforcement agency and I serve as a Commissioner on the Commission for Law Enforcement Accreditation (CFLEA) and previously served as the Chair of the Standards, Review and Interpretation  Committee for FCLEA and I will soon be Vice-Chair of the Commission. This requires me and allows FCSO to stay on the cutting edge of professional policing.  But, most importantly we don’t police the community – we police with the community. Those two words make a huge difference.

7. In potentially controversial situations such as use of force incidents, it is common to hear the use of force described by police as legal and within policy. But accepting that much, that’s different than saying whether the use of force is necessary or acceptable, even if it is legally defensible. Assuming you acknowledge a distinction between the two standards, how do you ensure that the use of force is not only legal, but also necessary and acceptable even when legal beyond question?

We have a de-escalation culture in FCSO.  It may be legal to use a specific level of force but our culture is to utilize the best response to achieve a safe resolution for all.  Use of force events have dropped by 46% from 28 incidents in 2016 under the former Sheriff to 15 cases in 2019, while at the same time offender arrests have increased by 38%. Use of force is defined as having to physically take someone to the ground, use of a Dart Firing Stun Gun (Taser), aerosol spray, impact weapon, non-lethal weapons, less-lethal weapons such as impact munitions up-to deadly force.  Based on the number of arrests per year, FCSO’s statistics show that an arrestee has a 0.04% chance of having force used by a Deputy during an arrest.

It is estimated that deputies would have been legally justified to use lethal force 12-15 times since I took office, but deputies were able to de-escalate these cases successfully. Our Agency, policies, training and deputies value life and we have proven the difference between the two standards you stated by our actions.

There is no question that the agency’s record in de-escalation is well established: that’s the next question’s premise. But taking your figure of 0.04 percent: your agency executed 2,611 arrests in 2019, according to the UCR report. That works out to 104 instances of use of force, or on average two per week. In a jurisdiction How is that reassuring?

Sorry missed a zero in the original answer. In 2019 our UCR Records indicate 2,611 arrests occurring by law enforcement deputies as you stated.Of that there were only 15 cases of law enforcement Deputies using any type of force in 2019. That equates to the likelihood of a Deputy using defensive tactics during an arrest at 0.00575%, significantly less than one percent.In any event, the takeaway should be that it is extremely unlikely that if you are arrested by an FCSO deputy that any force will be used at all during the arrest. The real takeaway should be that since I have been Sheriff the use of defensive tactics (Use of Force) has dropped significantly from 28 cases in 2016 under the former Sheriff to just 15 cases in 2019 despite FCSO deputies arresting more offenders since I have been Sheriff.And, the final takeaway should be that FCSO deputies only use force or defensive tactics based on the subject’s actions and resistance used against a Deputy Sheriff by the offender.

8. Four years ago we asked this question, and gladly ask it again with a minor variation: for eight years now, not a single individual has been killed by a Flagler County deputy in Flagler County. (One individual shot himself in a stand-off with deputies in November 2013, ex-Flagler deputy Daniel Ruddell was shot at last November as he attempted to flee from deputies, including Flagler deputies, in St. Johns County, and one suspect was shot and wounded in a Mondex standoff earlier this year). There has continued to be more documented instances of armed individuals who were peacefully apprehended after stand-offs or confrontations, all in contrast with surrounding counties, not to mention the rest of the country. To what do you attribute Flagler’s continuing trend, and what will you do to ensure that this, as opposed to a more violent, norm, continues?

Our recruitment, hiring practices to include thorough backgrounds to include psychological and polygraph testing, outstanding training and continuing education, Agency culture, policies, technology, supervision, and accountability mechanisms all support our de-escalation culture which will always continue with me as your Sheriff.

9. How do Black Lives Matter to you. How do you (or will you) ensure that they do among the ranks and in the county?

I care about each and every person we protect and serve regardless of their color or ethnic heritage.  Everyone deserves to be treated with professionalism, respect, courtesy and care.  Our deputies share that vision and those values. I attended a number of community events and peaceful marches this year, where our deputies interacted positively with the marchers, handed out water and protected them crossing intersections.  We received very positive feedback from those participating in the marches. In addition, we had already implemented the national and state police reforms that were suggested.

We work hard to reflect our community in our Agency through recruitment, hiring and training, We are not 100% reflective of our community in each ethnic group yet, but we have forged a strong relationship with Bethune-Cookman University and I have implemented internships and Academy scholarships to help break down the barriers many minorities often face when trying to enter law enforcement.

Since I have been Sheriff I have promoted the highest ranking African-American female in history in our Detention Facility to Commander; and the highest ranking Law Enforcement Division African-American male in many decades to Commander.

How does the internship with BCC work–how many interns actually work in your agency in a given year, and for what stretches of time? What is the ratio of white-to-minority deputies in the agency today compared to when you took over, where would you like that ratio to be–and if it’s not where you’d want it to be, will it be so in four years?

While I cannot predict the future and there are a lot of factors that are involved in minority recruiting my goal is to mirror the community demographics according to the census. It will require our minority community to encourage and support members of these different ethnic groups to apply.

We had five interns last summer three of whom were from Bethune-Cookman University.If we get past COVID-19, I expect we will have more this summer.Some just want to do a ride-along with a Deputy Sheriff.Others intern with our Victims’ Services team to assist crime victims, CSI, PAO, etc.Some just like to speak with a mentor and take a tour to learn about various career opportunities. The length of time an intern works at FCSO varies and depends upon their availability, class schedule, etc.

I’ve hired 21 minority Deputy’s since taking office in 2017 and sought the help of the NAACP and Bethune-Cookman University in recruiting more minority deputies.

Currently, we have four African-American Deputy Sheriff Trainees in the law enforcement academy that will join FCSO upon graduation.Two of these are from our internship program and partnership with Bethune-Cookman University. 

While we have no available data of the ratio between white and minority deputies under the former Sheriff (prior to 2017) to compare too, here is what it is today: