Vote to appoint Pierce County sheriff, end Swank’s term early goes to the ballot
Pierce County Sheriff Keith Swank’s continued employment as the county’s top law enforcement officer is headed to the November ballot.
The Pierce County Charter Review Commission voted Monday to send a proposal to the general election that would revert the county’s government to a system where the sheriff is appointed and terminate Swank’s four-year term on Jan. 1, 2027.
If passed, the sheriff would be appointed by the county executive and confirmed by the County Council.
In a 12-9 vote following months of discussion and marathon meetings, the 21-member commission voted Monday evening on its first proposal to amend the County Charter, the county government’s guiding document that acts as its constitution.
The commission is made up of three representatives from each of the County Council’s seven districts who were elected to their posts last fall. It has until June 29 to vote on the remaining proposals at final consideration. They require 11 votes to be placed on the Nov. 3 general election ballot.
Commissioners have described the proposal to appoint the sheriff as their most hotly contested charter amendment. When it was originally proposed by Commissioner Jake Hunter (District 4), it did not contain language that would end Swank’s time in office early. As an amendment to the proposal emerged Monday, commissioners who have opposed having an appointed sheriff described it as a slap in the face of the voters.
“This just undermines, I think, the integrity of local government,” Commissioner Mason Fletcher (District 5) said. “It undermines the integrity of this commission.”
Commissioner Justin Leighton (District 7) brought forward the amendment. He said the conversation surrounding an appointed sheriff began long before Swank took office and that voters in November should settle the issue.
“Let the final say be in November,” Leighton said.
The proposal appears to be a reaction to Swank’s statements in his first year and a half in office, which have generated conflicts between elected officials and spurred investigations from the state’s Criminal Justice Training Commission.
Hunter, a licensed tax practitioner who sponsored the appointed sheriff proposal, previously told The News Tribune that he disagrees with the way Swank has operated since he took office in 2025. He has said amending the charter to appoint the sheriff was the only way he could find to address the problem of a sheriff he describes as potentially an “existential threat” to the county.
On Monday, Hunter said by having an appointed sheriff, success in the office can be measured by outcomes rather than political popularity. He said the county could cast a nationwide net to find suitable candidates. He stressed that the commission was not making the final decision and that the voters would choose.
“We are expanding voter choice by sending this to the ballot,” Hunter said.
Swank is in the second year of his first four-year term, which he was elected to in November 2024. He attended Monday’s 6 p.m. meeting at the Pierce County Annex building in South Tacoma. He left after public comment ended at about 8:20 p.m. and before the commission began discussing ending his time in office early.
A phone call to Swank went straight to voicemail Monday night. He did not immediately respond to a follow-up message.
Voting in support of the proposal were Commission Chair Kelsey Barrans (District 1), Vice Chair Martha Lantz (District 7) and Commissioners Billy Jo Hetherington (District 2), Kate Ginn, Devin Rydel Kelly and Hunter (District 4), Troy Serad and Jenn Marie Strickling (District 5), George Conzuelo and Lisa Boyd (District 6) and Leighton and Brenda Lykins (District 7).
Largely united support for the proposal came from representatives for Tacoma, Gig Harbor, the Key Peninsula, University Place, Fircrest and Fife.
Voting against the proposal were Commissioners Sharon Hanek and Jerome O’Leary (District 1), Brenda Milewski and Elizabeth Herrera (District 2), Judson Willis, Caleb Heimlich and Hollie Rogge (District 3), Mason Fletcher (District 5) and Loujanna Rohrer (District 6).
Opposition was mostly made up of representatives for east Pierce County, Puyallup, Sumner, Bonney Lake, Graham, Buckley and Orting.
Heimlich (District 3) has voted against advancing an appointed sheriff proposal. At a March 16 meeting, he said he had regularly heard from constituents who felt the county government was Tacoma-centric. If county Executive Ryan Mello, who lives in Tacoma, is appointing the sheriff, Heimlich said the proposal will take votes away from people who live in unincorporated Pierce County.
“I just think the best way to have accountability, to have a process where the public has the say, is the direct election of the sheriff,” Heimlich said March 16.
If voters approve the charter amendment, Pierce County would join King County as the only of Washington’s 39 counties that appoint its sheriff. Experts who have studied sheriffs across the United States and who spoke to the commission have said most counties in the U.S. elect their sheriffs, and a small number of counties in Colorado, Kansas, New York and Pennsylvania appoint their sheriff. Outside of the U.S., most countries appoint their law enforcement leaders.
The last time voters had the chance to vote on the issue was 2006 when they approved a charter amendment to elect the sheriff with a 66 percent “yes” vote.
Before then Pierce County had appointed its sheriff since 1980 when the electorate first adopted the charter. That move came in the wake of Sheriff George Janovich’s corruption scandal. He and six others were convicted of racketeering in a 1979 trial. Six others pleaded guilty.
Asked about the appointed sheriff proposal Monday, a spokesperson for Executive Ryan Mello pointed out that he has long supported allowing voters to consider moving from elected to appointed sheriffs.
In 2021, when the County Council tried and failed to put an appointed-sheriff proposal on the ballot, Mello supported it and called it a move for accountability. NPR affiliate KNKX quoted him as saying of an elected sheriff: “There’s no ability to hold that person accountable between that point and the election.”
“Executive Mello has not reviewed or commented on the specifics of the Commission’s proposal, but as a general matter believes that efforts to promote transparency, public trust, and policy improvements throughout our justice system are worthy of public discussion,” said spokesperson Kari Plog, (who reported that KNKX story when she worked as a reporter).
Swank has repeatedly voiced his opposition to making his position appointed, and he has lately called on supporters to show up at commission meetings in large numbers in a stated effort to stop the commission’s work.
At a March 9 meeting, Swank said the proposal was an attempt to subvert the will of the voters. He called it a “purely political” move taken up because his opponents could not defeat him at the ballot box. Swank has argued that it is important to elect the sheriff because it means the position is accountable to voters rather than the county executive.
Although Swank spoke during public comment at the Monday meeting, he did not address the appointed sheriff proposal. Instead, he spoke in opposition to a charter amendment that proposes modernizing the charter’s anti-discrimination language. He said two complaints regarding his comments at previous meetings were submitted to the Criminal Justice Training Commission. Swank said he thought he would speak some more “normal language.”
“Instead of protesters, say terrorist,” Swank said. “Instead of larger size or plus size, just say fat, obese or huge. Let’s bring these words back. Climate change is a man-made hoax. Let’s make housewives great again. Let’s call radical leftists what they really are. They’re racist, Nazis and fascists.”
Someone who shares Swank’s preference of an elected sheriff is former Sheriff Paul Pastor, who served in the position for two decades. He spoke to the commission March 30 and noted that the county has had extreme examples of appointed and elected law enforcement officials. He referred to Janovich and former Tacoma police Chief David Brame, who fatally shot his wife and himself in front of his children in Gig Harbor.
“We need good, strong, publicly responsible law enforcement,” Pastor said. “And I think ultimately I believe we get that with elected, and people who are elected and actively go back out in the community and court input and make course corrections and look at what they’re doing and question themselves.”
This story was originally published June 16, 2026 at 5:00 AM.
