County Seat Newspaper
of Clare County

News from Your Sheriff- May 2022

Posted

 Finally, some nice temperatures and sun for us. It seems like it has been a long cold spring.

I want to congratulate or newest graduate of the Kirtland Police Academy, Deputy Zach Noble. Deputy Noble spent five years in the Navy on a nuclear submarine. He told me that he spent a total of three years, nine months, and 21 days under water during those five years. Deputy Noble started out with the Sheriff’s Office on our Reserves, then was hired part time working court security. He showed interest in staying in the area and becoming a certified deputy. We hired him full time and sent him through the police academy at Kirtland Community College. Deputy Noble graduated on May 6, 2022, from the academy in Grayling along with 10 others. Deputy Noble started his field training on May 9 which will last for an average of 14 weeks here. Again, Congratulations to Deputy Zach Noble.

We currently have a total of 177 people in our jail, which consist of 97 local, 73 federal, and seven diverted felons. During the month of April, the Clare County Central Dispatch documented 2,880 incidents for the county with your deputies responding to 1,748 of those incidents. That included 579 incidents handled by the Clare City Police, with other law enforcement handling 185 incidents in the county. Clare County fire units responded to 126 calls with MMR Ambulance responding to 169 calls. Our Animal Control officers responded to 38 calls.

We lost four lives in Clare County in the month of April in motor vehicle crashes. We have had a total of six fatal crashes since Jan. 1, 2022, in Clare County.

We are geared up for the summer months and look forward to people coming and vacationing in this area. Our marine boats are up and running and have deputies already assigned to be working the lakes in this county. We have struggled to replace much needed equipment for our marine patrol, especially the boats. We receive limited funds from the DNR to patrol the lakes in the county and in the past have received money to upgrade equipment. One of our boats is a 1997 and the other is a 2014. Constitutionally, the sheriff is only required to recover drowned persons, but we have always patrolled the lakes from money received from the Michigan Department of Natural Resources and individual lake associations who wanted extra patrols. We are working on one replacement vessel through grant funding, but we don’t think we will see that new boat until the end of summer.

With the Memorial Day holiday fast approaching, we welcome all those who will be out enjoying our natural resources in this county. Please read our County ORV Ordinance that is located at clareco.net under the “About Clare County” tab and then click on “County Ordinances”. ORVs are legal to travel on almost all roads in the county except those that are business routes and the main highways. The city of Clare and Harrison have their own ordinances which can be found on their websites.

We would like to pay our condolences to the family of the late Judge Thomas Evans. Judge Evans passed away May 2, 2022, in the presence of his family. All of us here at the Clare County Sheriff’s Office will dearly miss Judge Evans.

Stay Safe, Stay Strong

GOD Bless,

Sheriff John S. Wilson

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