Clay Whittle has been the sheriff of Columbia County for over 25 years. But before he was first elected in 1995, he had no aspirations to do anything but continue working under the late Sheriff Otis Hensley.
“I was completely happy being his chief deputy,” said Whittle. “The best way that I thought I could retire one day was being the chief deputy of the sheriff’s office working for one of the finest men I ever knew.”
Whittle transferred to Columbia County Sheriff’s Office in 1983, having started in law enforcement in Richmond County in 1979. Hensley was first elected sheriff in 1984. Over the years, Whittle worked his way up the ranks to be Hensley’s second in command as chief deputy.
One day, Hensley announced that he was losing a battle with liver cancer. Whittle recalls Hensley was put in the hospital on a Sunday evening. On Monday morning, Whittle was called to Hensley’s bedside to learn that the doctors had told Hensley he didn’t have long to live.
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“He had some things he wanted to do, and his first order of business was to take care of the sheriff’s office,” said Whittle. “He asked me would I run for sheriff in his place. That was the impetus for me becoming sheriff. I had never, ever thought about doing that.”
After talking it over with his wife, who encouraged him to go forward, Whittle gave Hensley his word that he would run. Hensley died Oct. 16, 1994, and Whittle kept his word.
Whittle has been elected six times since then. In his long tenure as sheriff, Whittle says he has not tried to replace Hensley.
“You don’t fill Otis Hensley’s shoes,” he said. “He was a unique man. He was absolutely the right man for the job.”
Whittle says he’s fundamentally concerned that he is acknowledged as having been fair and just.
“If there’s a legacy to be had, I want it to be known that we had a professional, honest law enforcement agencies and that we were fair.”
Whittle notes that the agency had been hamstrung by corruption and practices that he refers to as “the good old boy system,” which Henley had already been working to quell.
“He was doing his very best to ferret that out,” said Whittle. “And he did by and large, almost all of it. He didn’t really have as much corruption; he just had some folks that didn’t want to do their job the way it should be done. They were too used to the old ways under the previous administration, and it just didn’t want to change.”
Whittle describes the vision for the Sheriff’s Office he has since worked to continue realizing as changing this agency to be proactive.
Whittle said his philosophy of community policing is full engagement with the community.
“Not just answering calls and writing reports and being done with it, but actually engaging the community to see where the problems lie,” he said. “What the actual root of the problem is.”
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This manner of “community policing” entailed several measures over the years. In January 1995, the Sheriff’s Office began keeping records of the crime rate, which Whittle notes has dropped every year since 1996, and tracking the crime rate daily. The strategy also included directed patrols, in which officers were assigned to problem areas, as opposed to deploying random patrols.
Whittle says this strategy of law enforcement was used, at least in part, in response to the rapid growth of Columbia County from a rural, underfunded county to a suburb of the Augusta area.
“The opportunities were there to professionalize the agency,” said Whittle. “I think it was the right time that we made the switch to the community policing concept as opposed to the old traditional policing concept that used to exist back then. I think Hensley would be proud. I know he’s sitting up there, and he’s pretty pleased in what he sees as far as this agency is concerned.”
In 2021, Whittle was recognized by the Georgia Sheriff’s Association with the 2021 Sheriff of the Year Award, an honor to which he attributes the work of his 387 employees, deputies and staff, working in the Sheriff’s Office.
“That’s not me out there patrolling the streets making that happen,” said Whittle. “I realize that I’m the one that sets the tone and sets the policy. I understand that, and I realized what my role is, and I take it very seriously. But without the right people in the right positions from the command staff all the way down to the deputies, if they don’t do their job 100% It doesn’t happen. I’m proud to tell you they do.”
Skyler Q. Andrews is a staff reporter covering Columbia County with The Augusta Press. Reach him at skyler@theaugustapress.com.
