Town of Gilbert again exploring the idea of starting its own Police Department

Gilbert, SC 08/23/2024 (Paul Kirby) – The Town of Gilbert, SC is exploring the idea of starting its own Police Department to increase the citizens’ level of safety and supplement the Lexington County Sheriff’s Department’s force as it struggles with continued county growth and recruiting and retention challenges. According to Gilbert’s Mayor John Reeder, III, he is currently working with the town’s council and the state representatives who serve the area to find funding for the fledgling department.

“We have a council that split in a way right now,” Mayor Reeder said. “I don’t think any of our councilmembers believe it’s a bad idea to have a higher level of services, however, several members are concerned about what the department would cost us. They just don’t know if we can afford it.”

Jim Kyzer, a Lexington County Sheriff’s Department retiree and area resident and proponent of the plan said of the proposal, “Sheriff’s Department response times are getting longer and longer as the county adds more citizens and law enforcement officers get harder to find. People in the Gilbert area are also disappointed with the investigations that are taking place right now. When their car is broken into, a shop or garage is breached and plundered, or other property crimes occur, they want to see someone try and lift some fingerprints or collect some sort of evidence,” he continued. “In most cases, unless the crime is violent, that just doesn’t happen anymore. Many of our neighbors say that a deputy will come out and write a report, but they never see or talk to a detective.”

Mayor Reeder said that the Town had hired Lexington County legendary lawman Chris Garner as a consultant to work on this project. Garner retired from the Sheriff’s Department as a regional commander before he was hired to restart the Pelion Police Department. He stayed at Pelion until it was on firm footing and then retired again. He has since surfaced at the Springfield Police Department in Orangeburg County helping to manage that department and most recently the South Congaree Police Department where he worked as a captain in Special Services. Garner said that he has already received some of the approvals for Gilbert needed at the federal level and written many of the policy and procedural manuals that are required to run a Police Department in South Carolina. “It looks as if it’s the right time for Gilbert to start a Police Department. It’s a very fast-growing area of Lexington County and sadly, with the growth in population comes and increase in crime.”

Mayor Reeder said that if the department is established, it would probably be part-time at first and rely on officers that work full-time for other departments who would like to supplement their income working for somewhere like Gilbert during their time off. “We aren’t rushing into anything,” Reeder said. "To do this, we want the biggest majority around here to be ready and comfortable with it.”