Pope announces new Sheriff’s command staff

Robert Perea, The Fernley Reporter

Newly elected Lyon County sheriff Brad Pope has announced his new command staff.

In the biggest change, Pope is installing command positions in each patrol area, who he said will operate their substation as its own police department, guided by Sheriff’s Office policy and procedure.

“This decentralized command structure will allow the area commander to make decisions based on the needs of their community; these decisions are guided by Sheriff’s Office policy and procedure,” Pope said. “It may seem slight to some, but I believe this change will put a different perspective on our law enforcement services, and improve the quality of law enforcement in the County.”

Pope is also eliminating the position of undersheriff, replacing it with a chief deputy.

His chief deputy will be Mitch Brantingham, who will also be the northern area commander out of the Fernley substation.

Instead of three captains serving as patrol captain, administrative captain and jail captain, he wil have a western commander, northern commander and southern commander, with lieutenants in Silver Springs and in the jail.

Pope said the deputies assigned to the command positions share experience and training in special assignment command positions, vast experience in operations planning, tactical planning and execution, advanced field training, leadership training, applying leadership principles, incident command experience on critical incidents and officer involved shootings, strong community relations, strong relationships with County and City Officials, strong leadership qualities, team work, and advanced knowledge of the law and police principles.  

“There are numerous training hours invested into me and the members of the Command Staff,” he said. “I would safely estimate 10,000 hours of training have gone into the five of us combined.”

Pope will be sworn in as sheriff on Tuesday, Jan. 3 and he said the new command structure takes effect the same day.