JACKSONVILLE, Fla — First Coast News is interviewing all five candidates in the Jacksonville Sheriff’s race. Wayne Clark shares his top priorities.
Wayne Clark has spent more than 40 years in law enforcement. It’s his experience at different agencies that he says sets him apart from the other candidates vying to become sheriff.
“It is imperative that we choose a sheriff that has the experience and the qualifications to make sure that they're ready to lead on day one,” Clark said. “I want to be that sheriff so that when I leave, we can show that we've had a multi-year reduction in violent crime, that we've been able to build that relationship back in some of those disparate neighborhoods, building trust, being more accountable, being accessible, and being a sheriff out in the community.”
Clark grew up on Jacksonville's Eastside and has lived on the Northside for the past two decades.
“I have lived in Duval County my entire life and I plan on staying in Duval County.
He retired last year as the chief of the Duval County School Police Department. Before that was the police chief at the Jacksonville Aviation Authority and spent 30 years with the Jacksonville Sheriff's Office.
“I was able to reach the rank of division chief. I was over half the city. I was able to lead the sheriff’s office efforts from 2007 to 2010 to reduce murders and violent crime to a 25-year low,” Clark said. "When you look at having out-of-the-box ideas, you got to have been out of the box, those other candidates, all they know is what they know from the sheriff’s office. And we know from the last four or five years, that's not been working. I think I bring in a breath of fresh air, a wider lens.”
To address the spike in crime he wants to bring back programs that JSO had when he was on the force like intelligence-led policing.
“We used data and real-time street intelligence to tell us when to deploy our officers, where to deploy our officers, and who were the targets we needed to remove from the streets to bring down crime.”
And he would make patrol units more visible, having cruisers turn on one red and one blue light while patrolling.
“Because when we see the police, good people check themselves, bad people tend to go someplace else.”
Building a better relationship between the sheriff's office and the community is another one of his top priorities. He says he would be an engaged sheriff.
“People want to see their leader, people want to hear from that leader,” Clark said.
As for his thoughts on whether he thinks the Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office should continue to investigate its own officer-involved shootings, he said, “I have no doubt that the officers at the Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office have the integrity and the ability to thoroughly investigate themselves and officer-involved shootings. But people are demanding transparency. And there's no harm in allowing another agency i.e. the Florida Department of law enforcement to come in and take on that responsibility.”
He does not think officer-involved shootings on a regular basis should go before a grand jury. He proposes creating a Sheriff’s Internal Oversight Committee comprised of citizens who would be vetted and trained.
“It'd be like a quasi-judicial process that when a situation is over, they are given free rein to take a deep dive to look into this to make a determination. Did the officers follow policy? Did they follow the law? Did they follow national best practices and make a written recommendation to the sheriff?” Clark said. “And if those things make sense, we will change our policy and put those things into place.”
The special election is August 23.