Politics

Sheriff sets table for 2018 re-election campaign

Sheriff Charlie McDonald enjoys a baseball game with Boys & Girls Club members with two of his closest advisers, his wife, Jennie, and Maj. Frank Stout.

By Bill Moss, Published: October 30, 2016

Like all politicians, Charlie McDonald is quick to say that he’s not a politician. But he’s got more evidence than most.

To begin with, he did not want the job he has now.

After Sheriff Rick Davis’s stunning resignation the day before Thanksgiving 2011 amid a sexual harassment complaint by a female deputy, the Republican executive committee began meeting to find a replacement.
“When the former sheriff started having issues I had been away from here for about a year and a half and I had never had any aspirations to become sheriff,” McDonald, 62, said in an interview. “In fact in all honesty, I hate to say it, I probably looked down my nose at anyone who thought they wanted to be sheriff. I guess I didn’t have a lot of respect maybe for politicians in general. I worked for some good sheriffs. Albert Jackson and George Erwin were very good sheriffs. Rick had some really good things going.”
McDonald had retired as a captain after a career in which he climbed through the ranks from road deputy to criminal investigations to jail administrator. A SWAT team veteran, he worked after his sheriff’s career as a training consultant in the U.S. and abroad. Back home in Mills River, he had no interest in the sudden opening at the sheriff’s office.

‘Not only no but hell no’

“But the fact of the matter is a couple of different people came to my house and basically said, ‘Things aren’t good and they need somebody.’ Here’s what I was told: ‘The executive committee is going to need somebody to step in and they told me this very plainly. They don’t want somebody from inside because it’s going to look like the same old same old. They don’t want somebody who’s from so far outside that they don’t understand Henderson County. You would be a candidate because you’ve been away and yet you’ve got a history here.’ The first couple of times I was approached I said, ‘Not only no but hell no. Are you kiddin’ me? There’s no way.’”
His closest adviser gave him a wakeup call. His wife, Jennie, knew the local law enforcement landscape. Her brother, George Erwin, had been a popular sheriff for 12 years; at the time she was secretary to the district attorney.
“About the third time it happened I told Jennie, we were sitting in the living room — I remember it like it was yesterday — and she said ‘What happened?’ I said, ‘Well, you’ll never believe this. So-and-so asked me … and I relayed the story. And she said, ‘What’d you say?’ I looked at her incredulously and I said, ‘I said hell no, Jennie, what did you expect I’d say?’ And she looked at me and all of a sudden I felt like a 3-year-old being scolded by his mom and she said, ‘You’ve had several people ask. You’ve done this for 25 years. Do you not think we should have talked about it and prayed about it and seen (about it) because I don’t think this is happening for no reason.’
“And when she said that I told her I would think about it. And this is where everybody will think I’m a nut job but I don’t care. I went out and I prayed about it and the thing that I heard clearly, not a spoken voice, I got an impression from God that said when you’re willing to go risk in that place and you have to rely on me for everything you’ll find what it is you’re looking for. And I knew right then that if I said no, I was still good to go, but if I said yes then I was actually stepping out on a risk to do something I had a potential to fail greatly at but I felt like if I said yes that I would have what I needed.”
“I’ll be the first to tell you I was not prepared,” he added. “I didn’t study for this. I didn’t train for it. At times I wondered if I knew what was going on but the fact of the matter is this has been one of the most rewarding times of my life. It’s been the most challenging, the most trying, the most frustrating, the most tragic at times and yet I know that what we’ve accomplished is truly because not only my faith in God but this community. I have people tell me all the time, they pray for me and they pray for this agency.”

Stumble at the starting line

McDonald’s inexperience showed up early in his 2014 election campaign. A campaign finance filing from his first fundraiser, a successful golf tournament, reported $3,050 in cash donations of more than $50 each, a violation of state law. McDonald wanted to return the donations but state law didn’t allow that. It was a black eye for a candidate who not only looked like Mr. Clean but had tried to make ethics and departmental integrity his brand.
This time around, he’s better organized and fully versed on campaign finance law. The reluctant politician is now a formidable incumbent — and he’s taking steps to make sure would-be rivals know the office of sheriff won’t be an open seat two years from now. Although the 2016 election dominates the headlines today, McDonald is already focused on 2018. He kicked off his re-election campaign on Oct. 17 with a sold-out golf tournament at Kenmure Country Club.
“I came in as an appointee, so the concept of what it would take to run a campaign was foreign to me,” he said last week when asked why he is starting now. “Two and a half years later I found myself facing opposition in both a primary and a general election and both times I had to start from zero to raise a significant amount of money to get elected.
“So we figure with where we are right now I have contacts and resources, so rather than come to folks at the very last minute with a big needs list we’re just trying to make sure for the next several years we’ll probably have an event once or twice a year — things that aren’t under a lot of pressure, just a lot of fun. The golf tournament was incredibly successful. We had a full field and the day it started we actually had a team show up. We were running around trying to find a spare golf cart.” He estimated that the event raised $10,000.

‘We’re all here for the same reason’

One thing McDonald wants to talk about in a re-election campaign is more community involvement in policing and grassroots approach that encourages neighbors to help neighbors. He pointed to the flood recovery in Eastern North Carolina as an example of solutions working best close to home.
“The thing that’s going to make the most significant impact is local area governments and communities working together to meet their own specific needs,” he said. “Those are the people who know each other, who know the topography and all the nuances in their community. They can put together their own resources better than Raleigh can put together something and send it to them and have it be a one size fits all. … The office of sheriff is really born out of that community concept. I think really that’s my vision going forward.”
He’s on a winning streak when it comes to sheriff’s office funding, which must be approved by the Board of Commissioners. His deputies got a pay raise larger than the countywide cost of living increase. Then commissioners authorized a $20 million training center McDonald insists is needed to stay ahead of threats to the community and deputies’ own safety.
“I think we always do,” he replied when asked if he still had more selling to do on the need for the training center. “I believe I owe that to commissioners who stepped out and bought the vision that I had.
“I think if people pay attention every day — we’re always hearing about law enforcement training, law enforcement use of force,” he added. “I don’t look at what happens yesterday or today, I look at trends.”
McDonald still styles himself as a reformer who has stabilized a department rocked by the Rick Davis scandal. It’s come out the other end stronger and more professional, he says, and he’s learned to surround himself with a command staff and corps of deputies that support his vision.
“I think the good thing I have going for me by the grace of God is I’m smart enough to know that I’m not smart enough,” he said. “I also know how to find the right kind of people who are led by the right kind of conviction. I believe we’re all here for the same reason and it’s been a recipe for success. … One of the advantages I know I have is I wasn’t looking for this job when I found it and if I lose this job by doing the right thing then it’s time for me to go anyway.”