- February 11, 2026
It has been the honor of my life to lead the Flagler County Sheriff’s Office since 2017. Our citizens have always been our strong partners in all our successes. You can be immensely proud of all the historic, unprecedented, and nationally recognized achievements of your Sheriff’s Office.
Our team has ensured that Flagler County is one of the safest communities in America. Together, working with our citizens, we have cut crime by over 50% since 2017 to a 30-year low in one of the fastest growing counties in the State of Florida. 92% of Palm Coast residents reported feeling safe in their 2024 community survey. Palm Coast is now ranked 39th safest town in America and second safest in Florida while Flagler County is ranked 91st out of 3,143 counties in the United States for crime safety.
Fiscal discipline, transparency, and accountability have defined the Sheriff’s Office under my leadership. We have a top tier finance staff, model policies governing our budget, and the fiscal controls of the FCSO are regularly confirmed by external and internal audits. Innovation, increased efficiency, and continual cost savings have become the culture at the Flagler County Sheriff’s Office.
The Sheriff Perry Hall Inmate Detention Facility has achieved two accreditations and reaccreditation for the first time in a century. Since March 2022, the Sheriff’s Office has saved taxpayers nearly $5.27 million in inmate medical costs. This is just one example of the savings and efficiencies we have implemented since I became your Sheriff.
The Flagler County Sheriff’s Office is now a Five Diamond Accredited Law Enforcement Agency certifying that all aspects of the organization represent the use of model policies and best practices. Knowing our reputation for best practices and model programs, the FCSO keeps winning major federal grants and securing new opportunities for state funding. Making sure your tax dollars sent to Washington DC and Tallahassee come back to benefit you, we have applied for and received almost $8 million dollars in federal and state grants to help make your community as safe as possible.
An independent panel of experts with the Daytona News-Journal has twice named the Flagler County Sheriff’s Office one of the “Ten Best Places to Work” in Flagler and Volusia Counties, as a result, and unlike most agency’s today we have no vacancies. The FCSO had already met or exceeded all principles and policies for best practices in law enforcement to ensure citizen trust, transparency, and accountability recommended by the Florida Police Chiefs Association (FPCA) and major national organizations well before many others in America did.
Community support is very strong. 153,000 citizens follow the FCSO’s Facebook page demonstrating a high level of community engagement. Thousands of citizens call, email, and post to express their gratitude and dozens of small businesses and families regularly bring by meals to share their appreciation with the FCSO team.
Through our continuous commitment to innovation and professional excellence, the FCSO and individual members of our team have been recognized with over two dozen prestigious national, statewide, and regional awards since I became Sheriff. The Flagler County Sheriff’s Office has won national, statewide, and regional awards for technology, victim’s services, traffic safety, innovation at our jail, and multiple members of our team have been singled out as the best statewide and nationally. This results in the FCSO team being continually asked by others for advice on how to excel in community trust and accountability, analytics, accreditation, training, crime-reduction, and preventing domestic violence.
In 2016, I was asked by our community to run for Sheriff after they had previously fired Mr. Manfre and were about to fire him once again due to his failed leadership. He had also been fined several thousand dollars and publicly reprimanded by the Governor and Cabinet for serious ethical violations. This is the same Governor and Cabinet that honored me in 2015 for saving the life of a fellow deputy sheriff while being shot three times doing it.
Mr. Manfre claims to have 25 years of law enforcement experience, but he has never attended even one police academy. He was elected Sheriff twice and fired by the voters twice. During his trial testimony on his multiple Florida ethics law violations case, he stated he was an intern with the Bronx District Attorney's Office. There is no other verified true “law enforcement” experience. I have 50 years of verifiable and proven law enforcement and public safety experience.
Mr. Manfre also claims that crime is “predominately committed by school age persons” and “…older adults commit much less crime...” Let’s look at the facts. In 2025, a total of 3,318 people were arrested in Flagler County — 66% of those arrested were under age 40 and 70% of those arrests were under age 30. Only 11% of the total arrests were people aged 18 or younger and only 20% of arrests were people over age 51.
During Mr. Manfre’s disastrous years as Sheriff (2001-2004 and 2013-2016) crime went up 22%. The only years that crime went down were when I served as his Undersheriff between 2013 and 2014.
Under my leadership, and with support from the Board of County Commissioners and the City of Palm Coast Mayor and Council along with a motivated team, proper training, better staffing, technology and equipment, crime is down over 50%, despite being one of the fastest growing counties in Florida and amid a population increase of 43,353 new residents and a 14% increase in calls for service since 2017.
To accomplish this, we implemented innovative programs like deputies monitoring juveniles on probation which ensures a 96% compliance rate preventing and reducing juvenile crime. We have hired and funded 90-new deputy sheriff and professional support positions and raised starting deputy salaries from $36,327 to $56,080 to remain competitive (and we are still paid lower than Volusia and St. Johns County law enforcement agencies). And every year I’ve been your Sheriff, the County reduced county-wide ad valorem taxes and in many years Palm Coast reduced their millage rate including once a full rollback, while both governments were still able to fund public safety as a priority.
My job as an elected constitutional officer is to protect and serve our community and identify needs to make our community safer. Flagler County recently purchased a new helicopter at a cost of almost $6 million tax dollars with no increased service levels. (In fact, recently we learned the law enforcement technology had been removed, thereby reducing its capability.) I recognized a need for 24/7 coverage for medivac and police missions. This need could not be filled under the current structure, so I discussed a public-private partnership with a business owner. He agreed to sell the almost brand-new helicopter to FCSO for $575,000 in tax dollars and $125,000 of drug seized money with no strings attached. The helicopter is valued at $1.5 million. He donated the remaining value of $800,000 to the citizens of Flagler County. The payment came from non-reoccurring money saved by being fiscally conservative. Under Florida law, no approval of the BOCC was required. As to operating and staffing costs, we plan to operate and staff it within our existing budget by being a good steward of existing tax dollars.
There will be no change in the number of deputies serving you to do this. This helicopter will enable us to locate lost and missing senior citizens and children and aid in the safety of citizens and our deputies when finding and apprehending dangerous criminals. Sometimes, a Sheriff must make hard and bold decisions. This was not a hard decision. It was a bold decision to improve emergency services at a fantastic deal for the taxpayer.
When I took office in 2017, I inherited a building from Mr. Manfre which was making dozens of employees continuously sick, technology from the early 2000’s, equipment that was old and run- down, a chronically underfunded and understaffed law enforcement organization (confirmed by two independent studies and in Mr. Manfre's opinion piece), policies and programs which needed to be modernized, a talented but underpaid team lacking the leadership they needed - and a community craving to have pride and confidence in their Sheriff’s Office. I was never allowed to fix those problems in the 2-years I served as his Undersheriff because Mr. Manfre would make political decisions instead of the right decisions. After you elected me in 2016, I could now make very positive changes as your Sheriff and I have! Nine years later, the results are in and your Sheriff’s Office is now continually recognized both nationally and statewide for professional excellence in everything we do. Crime is down over 50%!
The men and women of FCSO and I very much appreciate your support every single step of the way. Together, we have made Flagler County one of the safest communities in America.
Editor's note: In response to Sheriff Staly's comments on Manfre making "political decisions instead of the right decisions" in the second to last paragraph, Manfre said the following:
I was in the renovated hospital which became the Sheriff's Operation Center for almost a year and a half and there were no instances of any illnesses. Some mold was found after they demolished the patient wings when Staly came into office. Mold can be remediated.
Instead Staly moved out of the building and refused to reoccupy the building. A $14 million dollar cost of the building which taxpayers are still paying for was lost. It was sold for $750,000 to a buyer who turned around and sold it for $3.5 million dollars. The present occupant found no air quality issues when they bought the building.
Staly then convinced the Commission to build him a $26 million dollar operation center. So now taxpayers are now paying for two operations centers.
Staly as my undersheriff was part of every decision making policy as was my management style. He was involved in every political and financial decision made while he worked for me. Regardless of Staly’s comments, he is still responsible for an astounding 120% increase in his budget that is not supported by population demographics and crime statistics.
