Meet the Candidate: Rip Brown – Robertson County Sheriff

BRYAN, Texas (KBTX) – Early voting is underway and one race Robertson County voters will see on their ballot is County Sheriff.

All six candidates will appear on News 3 at Six before election day on March 5.

Gerald Yezak has held the position since 1996, but he is not running for reelection. Six candidates are vying for the position: Karen Box, Rip Brown, Johnny Lopez, Bill Ruland, S.A. Smith and Miguel Vasquez.

Brown joined News 3 at Six on Thursday to discuss why he believes he’s the right person for the job.

“I am running for election because I love my job. They always say if you love your job, you never work a day in your life, and I’ve been wearing a badge for about 40 years and I’ve been with the sheriff’s office for about eight years and a patrol sergeant for six,” Brown said. “I get along with everybody. I have a good report with the local agencies: Franklin, Calvert, Hearne, Bremond. I get along with the judge, the district judge, county judge. I get along with the commissioners, I work well with the commissioners and I feel like I’m qualified.”

Brown says he thinks the current sheriff has done a great job, but there are a few new things he would like to implement.

“One of them is an exit interview to find out why we are losing good employees. The second thing is, I want to have a weekly meeting with the staff,” Brown said. “When we lose somebody, we lose a lot of money right there. Because we put enough effort training them. Say we use the jail for instance, when we hire someone in the jail, they have to go to school, and they don’t actually learn that job for six months to a year, and then we turn around and lose them, I want to find out why.”

Robertson County is a growing community, and Brown says he doesn’t believe they have the resources to serve that growing community at this time.

“We need more personnel on the street and we need more personnel in the jail. We are shorthanded. As it is right now, the budget is not there to support that,” Brown said. “My goal is to put on some reserve officers to help us transport prisoners to the court and to do some patrol out in the county because we are getting overwhelmed with cow calls.”

In the last two years, Browns says he went to commissioners and got approved for another deputy and a transport officer.

You can watch our full interview with Brown in the player above.