Lewis County Sirens.com

By Sharyn  L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter

This was updated at 12:23 p.m.

In his first day on the job, new Thurston County Sheriff John Snaza oversaw a ceremony commissioning his new command staff.

They are:

• Undersheriff James Chamberlain, a 35-year veteran of the sheriff’s office who was previously the operations bureau chief.

• Chief Dave Pearsall who will be responsible for the field operations bureau, overseeing the patrol division and its specialty units. Pearsall, a 24-year member of the office, previously was chief of the services bureau.

• Chief Brad Watkins will be in change of the support services bureau, which handles warrants, civil issues and has taken the detective division into its fold. Watkins, a 22-year veteran of the sheriff’s office was previously the undersheriff.

• Chief Todd Thoma continues to head the corrections bureau

• Fiscal manager Joan Plaja continues in her position.

• Executive aid Faye Burnett continues in her position.

Chamberlain is serving temporarily as Snaza’s second in command as the undersheriff he will appoint is still employed by the Washington State Patrol, according to office spokesperson Lt. Greg Elwin.

Capt. Tim Braniff, who works in Olympia with the state patrol’s investigative assistance division, is expected to join the sheriff’ office in sometime after the beginning of February, Elwin said.

•••

A typographical error in this news item was corrected to reflect that Chief Dave Pearsall is a 24-year member of the office, not a 24-year-old deputy.

Tags: By Sharyn L. Decker, news reporter

This entry was posted on Tuesday, January 4th, 2011 at 11:57 am and is filed under News briefs. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.