Special election for Jacksonville sheriff: Interview with candidate Tony Cummings

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — Duval County voters have a big decision coming up -- who will become the next sheriff?

That person will lead an agency of more than 3,000 employees with a $550 million budget. Action News Jax has highlighted each of the five candidates running for sheriff, including Tony Cummings. You can watch our full interview with Cummings below.

Tony Cummings

Dr. Tony Cummings is a United States Army veteran. After retiring from the military, he spent 28 years with the Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office. He joined JSO as a patrol officer then worked as a crisis intervention officer and field training officer. Dr. Cummings has a Doctorate of Education in Organizational Leadership.

When asked what the biggest issue he would address as sheriff, Dr. Cummings replied, “I like to see some public oversight. I’m the only candidate in the race that support a public accountability office inside the sheriff’s office and also civilian review boards.” He added, “We don’t do a great job of messaging, our data collection is flawed in many ways, and how we derived many of our decisions, the public don’t know because they don’t have a seat at the table. Well, I want to correct those issues by giving them a seat at the table with that public accountability office.”

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