Candidates for Peach County Sheriff answer the questions on voter's minds based on Listening Lab Results
In sit down interviews with each candidate for sheriff, 13WMAZ asked about issues important to you: violent crime, ethics in government and immigration.
Peach County Sheriff's Race Answering your questions from Listening Lab
13WMAZ is bringing you answers to questions you have for candidates based on the information viewers gave us during the 2024 Listening Labs.
This election cycle, we're incorporating the results we gathered from the Listening Lab surveys Central Georgians filled out earlier in the year.
In Peach County, the top 5 issues participants pointed out were: inflation, violent crime, ethics in government, healthcare cost and access and immigration.
We sat down with the two candidates in the race for sheriff: Democrat Robert 'Buck' Shannon and Republican Ben 'Ty' Matthews.
In separate sit down interviews, we discussed the three issues you said were most important to you when it comes to the sheriff's race: violent crime, ethics in government and immigration.
Here is what the candidates had to say:
Ethics in Government Listening Lab Issue 1
What will you do to avoid conflicts of interest while serving as sheriff?
Matthews: "Using our man power appropriately at the sheriffs department and being very tough on crime. The being out, being present is something that has to be done. When you're proactive violent crime seems to be reduced."
Shannon: "I would come up with a joint task force between Byron, Fort Valley and Peach County Sheriff's office, come up with a gang unit, a violent crime unit so we can pinpoint these areas and get the officers to go (to) those certain areas where we have the violent crimes or some kind of gang activity."
Immigration Listening Lab Issue 2
How would you handle situations involving undocumented immigrants who have committed non-violent versus violent crimes?
Matthews: "We will also build a relationship with our immigration and ICE and have those people moved to their system. If they're causing problems here and they're here illegally, they need to be removed from our country."
Shannon: "There's the HB 1105 that we're gonna continue to do, so if somebody comes to jail and they don't have the correct documents and they're a immigrant were we fill out the forms and turn it into ICE."
Violent Crime Listening Lab Issue 3
How will you work to build public trust and demonstrate ethical behavior in law enforcement?
Matthews: :"Allowing the citizens to know they can come to the sheriff and find out what's going on and us being open and being open and talking with everyone and letting them know what's going on."
Shannon: "Introduce ourselves and just talk to the public, see what they need or uh what, what we're doing that's making them happy and what, what we're doing that they're not happy with."
Meet the Candidates Background
Robert 'Buck' Shannon is 49. He lives in Fort Valley. He's worked for the Peach County Sheriff's Office since 1997, serving in roles as a jailer, to school resource officer and now works as a gang investigator.
Shannon has four children and three grandchildren.
Ben 'Ty' Matthews is 58. He lives in Fort Valley. The army veteran has more than 30 years of law enforcement experience. Currently he is police chief in Roberta and before that he served in Cordele and Fort Valley departments.
Matthews has three children and three grandkids.
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