Q&A With Sheriff-elect Kent Vander Kamp

The contest for Deschutes County Sheriff was one of the most closely watched local races this election season. It marked the first time since 2000 that the seat was open without an incumbent running for reelection.

Upon announcing his retirement in the fall of 2023, Sheriff Shane Nelson endorsed Capitan William Bailey to replace him. Soon after, Sergeant Kent Vander Kamp announced he was entering the race too, and positioned himself as an alternative to the current administration.

Nelson’s decade-long run as sheriff was marked by claims of retaliation and intimidation from DCSO employees – along with expensive lawsuits. Vander Kamp promised that if elected he would bring a different leadership style to the office and reign in spending. The message appears to have struck a chord, despite revelations over the summer of his previous employment history – and possible termination – from La Mesa police department in Southern California in the mid-90s.

Vander Kamp, who won by nearly 20 percentage points, sat down with the Source Weekly the week after the election, to discuss his plans for change within DCSO and the issues he’s looking to tackle once he takes office next year.

(This interview was edited for length and clarity.)

“The priority for me right now is just assembling a group of command staff and leaders in the organization that are going to bring fresh change in perspective.” – Kent Vander Kamp

Source Weekly: Congratulations on your win. How are you feeling with the election behind you? From our earlier talks, you seemed pretty confident it was going to go this way.

Kent Vander Kamp: I think our message was well received, and I think that was reinforced by just the margin of victory. I think people really resonated with our message, and they delivered quite a message too, which I took as, “enough is enough.” They were ready for change. So, the mandate was pretty clear.

We had a couple hundred people at the election party that were really, really excited. I think they’re excited for the future. For me, is obviously just a kind of a great relief just to be done with the last year and year and a half. It was a wave of emotions. I think my family’s glad that it’s over. And I think we’re excited to get into the next phase, which we’ve already started on.

SW: What have you started on already? Can you elaborate on that?

KVK: We’ve already started thinking about, really, the future. Like what our first 90 days, and what our first year, and what our first four years are going to look like. The big priority for me right now is just assembling a group of command staff and leaders in the organization that are going to bring that fresh change in perspective.

I started those conversations recently, and I think the next couple of weeks, I should have them finalized. And then at the same time, I’m working on what I want to accomplish in that first couple of months.

SW: How do you feel that going through this election impacted your profile within the sheriff’s office and the greater community?

KVK: You know, there’s obviously two very different things. The people in the office I’ve worked with, I’ve worked with for a long time. They know who I am and how I work, and I know who I am, and that a lot of that was politically driven in an attempt to just spin a story to the taxpayers.

Internally, I don’t know that it made any difference because people know who I am and how I’ve worked. Externally, I think a lot of people read what it was and took it with a grain of salt. I’ve had many people come up to me and say, ‘Hey, you know, we don’t really care what happened 30 years ago. You’re just killing it, you’re doing a job.’ And you have people that believe everything they read and don’t really ask questions. And they’ll say, ‘Hey, you’re not a nice person. I don’t think you’re a nice person.’ But what I always point to is the scoreboard. In the end, it was clear that people believed in me and believed in my words and my mission.

SW: Beyond morale, what are you focusing on when you’re in office come January?

KVK: I’ve got 10 areas that I identified as a priority. The first one is getting back out there. Those 20,000 undervotes are concerning. [Over 20,000 people abstained from voting for sheriff in the election, according to Deschutes County voting reports.]

I really want to get out there and have some engagement, some listening sessions. I think now that we’re past the campaign, we can sit and host some meetings equally and residents from different areas.

Also, we really need to have a thorough assessment of the sheriff’s office capabilities — our sources, our staffing, our talents within the office. There is so much talent there. And then also start looking at some policies that will make sure that we can offer the service to deliver all the identified areas where we are lacking.

We also need to strengthen relationships with our partners, both law enforcement and fire and social service providers, and ODOT. Just get out there and start tackling those complex issues like homelessness and drugs and traffic.

But the big piece, which I think is going to be the heavy lift, is really getting in there and doing some budget optimization. We really need to ensure that these taxpayer dollars are being used efficiently and effectively. That’s honestly the most important thing for me. I should probably put that on top of the list, but they’re all important to me.

This article appears in Source Weekly November 7, 2024.