It has been an honor to serve the residents of Lyon County for the past 34 years with the last 8 years as your elected Sheriff. As your Sheriff, I have always held myself and our employees to the highest standards possible. We have strived to meet the needs of the citizens, to hold our people accountable, to be fiscally responsible and to uphold the Constitution of the United States. During my two successful campaigns, I stuck to the issues and stayed away from bad-mouthing my opponents and “mud-slinging”, just as Undersheriff Torres is doing in his current campaign.
I am greatly disturbed that Mr. McNeil has chosen to do otherwise. His campaign is filled with untruths, lies, false statistics and unethical actions. He has violated the Lyon County Sheriff’s Office’ Code of Conduct and has put our agency into turmoil through making promises that he can’t keep, his threats of people losing their jobs, and by all of his untrue statements. The fact is, Mr. McNeil does not have any of the qualifications needed to be our elected Sheriff so he has chosen to attack a very successful agency and a command staff with over 110 years of total experience.
I contemplated how to respond to McNeil’s accusations and untruths. It is actually quite difficult responding to the negative comments, especially since they come from a deputy of our agency. I could fill a page with issues that we have had to address with Mr. McNeil’s performance as a deputy but that would not be the right thing to do. Instead I ask you, the voters, to look at the qualifications of the two candidates. Our Undersheriff has over 22 years of law enforcement experience in Lyon County and in all levels of supervision. He has worked his way up through the ranks and has prepared throughout his career to be our next Sheriff. Mr. McNeil has 12 years’ experience as a deputy. He has never been able to promote in our agency yet he thinks he can do the job of Sheriff? I think not. Another disturbing fact is that Mr. McNeil has surrounded himself with disgruntled former employees and politicians who want to control the Sheriff’s Office. That should put fear into all of the citizens. One might ask, if things are so bad, why is McNeil still collecting a pay check here? One should also ask, what has McNeil done to better the situation? In reality, his performance is mediocre at best, his actions are detrimental and not beneficial, and I believe that he is a disgruntled employee who is glad to be receiving a paycheck from the citizens.
Mr. McNeil was responsible for bringing the powerful California Police Union (PORAC) and its Nevada Chapter (PORAN) to Lyon County. PORAC and PORAN have been responsible for degrading the rights and abilities of law enforcement administrators to run their agencies over the past several years. As the President of the Nevada Sheriff’s and Chief’s Association in 2013, and also during my involvement with the 2011 Legislature, I saw firsthand the damage that PORAN did to our laws and to our abilities to run accountable law enforcement agencies. McNeil was on the PORAN Board of Directors when this was happening. Until McNeil brought PORAN to Lyon County, the Sheriff’s Office Administration had a great working relationship with the Deputies’ Association (LCSEA). With McNeil as the president of the Deputies’ Association, that relationship changed and became confrontational and detrimental to a harmonious work environment. McNeil allowed PORAN to dictate the direction of the local association. Only since McNeil’s removal as president has our relationship with the LCSEA been returned to being productive.
This Sheriff’s election has two possibilities: The preferred is that we elect a Sheriff who is prepared to take on the challenges of budgeting, of personnel administration, of proper policy and procedure development, of adhering to our Constitution and of continuing on with the successes that we have accomplished over the past several years, all-the-while becoming a model Sheriff’s Office which sets a shining example for others across our State. Conversely, if Mr. McNeil is elected, I see accountability being thrown out, citizens being mistreated, a Sheriff being controlled by politicians, more involvement by federal regulatory agencies and an unethical back-stabbing environment in the Sheriff’s Office which will have a direct impact on services to the public.
This is a very serious matter and I implore everyone to vote for the only man qualified to take over as our next Sheriff, Albert Torres.
Allen Veil is the Lyon County sheriff. His opinions are his own and not those of the Nevada Appeal.
