08/19/2025
When I campaigned for County Commissioner, I promised public safety was a top priority. Today, through teamwork and dedication, we were able to strengthen the Jasper County Sheriff’s Office - TX and give the men and women who keep us safe the support they deserve. Thank you again to all who serve and keep up the great work!
Sheriff Havard expresses gratitude and appreciation to County Judge and County Commissioner’s
During my campaign for the Office of Jasper County Sheriff, one of my campaign pledges was to do everything I could to put more deputies out on the streets in our county. For many years, our county has needed more deputies. Historically, a common practice has been to assign one patrol deputy on the north end of our county and one patrol deputy on the south end of our county per shift. Obviously, with a county as geographically long as ours, this practice has many challenges such as extended response times, lack of visibility in our neighborhoods, officer safety concerns and many others. Past administrations have done an excellent job of making the most with the resources they had. Upon taking office on January 1st, 2025, I made it clear to our employees that we were going to work hard, make the citizens of our county our priority and hold ourselves to the highest level of transparency and accountability. Since being in office, our men and women in uniform have worked really hard and are making a positive impact in our community. We are far from perfect and we have made some mistakes, but I can tell you first-hand that we have made many good, solid criminal cases, arrested hundreds of criminals, increased our visibility and conducted ourselves with professionalism. Again, we have a long way to go to become more efficient and effective, but we are making steady progress. We have thieves and drug dealers on the move and are doing our very best to protect our citizens and their property.
Several months ago, during budget workshops, I requested three additional deputies from our County Judge and County Commissioner’s. The request was made as a public safety necessity to ensure we are getting as many “boots” on the ground and in our neighborhoods as possible. This morning, the County Judge and our County Commissioner’s granted the request and provided our agency with the three additional deputies. To my knowledge, this is the most deputies ever granted by any Jasper County Commissioner’s Court at one time. One deputy will be funded initially from our prisoner reimbursement fund and then incrementally absorbed by the general fund over the course of four years. The other two deputy positions will be fully funded by the general fund revenue. They gave our agency the approval to immediately hire the deputy being funded by prisoner reimbursement. The other two deputy positions will be effective on January 1st, 2026. We anticipate all of our positions being filled in the next couple of months by our cadets who are currently in the Police Academy in Jasper. We have identified the cadets that we believe will do an excellent job for our agency and the citizens of Jasper County. 
Additionally, all of our employees were given a one dollar an hour raise with the exception of the Chief Deputy and Major- they will get a two dollar an hour raise. (These positions do not allow for overtime/comp pay). The court also authorized an increase to our certificate pay for our deputies, jailers and dispatchers. This increase will go from $150 a month up to $275 a month. Additionally, several months ago we requested the DPS administrative assistant (who is a county employee) be re-assigned to our office. The Court approved that request, and beginning on January 1st, 2026, Administrative Assistant Debbie Berry will be assigned to our office in Buna. This reassignment will allow our deputies to spend more time in and around our neighborhoods, businesses and schools. We are looking forward to Debbie joining our team. She will continue to assist DPS as needed.
I would like to sincerely thank our County Judge and our County Commissioner’s for their support to the Jasper County Sheriff’s Office and to the citizens of Jasper County. Their commitment to Public Safety is unmatched and is their top priority. This unprecedented action will significantly increase our visibility and consistently provide more professional law enforcement coverage than anytime before.
It is an honor of a lifetime to represent the people of Jasper County as their Sheriff. We will continue to work hard and do the very best we can to protect our citizens and their families.
Respectfully,
Chuck Havard
Jasper County Sheriff
