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Kalispell native Brian Heino takes over as Flathead County Sheriff

Posted at 8:17 PM, Jan 15, 2019
and last updated 2019-01-15 22:21:40-05

KALISPELL – The Flathead Valley has a new sheriff in town.

Brian Heino took office on January 1, 2019, after former Sheriff Chuck Curry decided not to run for re-election.  Curry had served as sheriff for eight years.

Heino was born and raised in the Flathead Valley and graduated from Flathead Valley High School in 1996.

“As a kid I think we all have the dreams of being a policeman or fireman as we started off younger, and as I grew it was different adventures, but my family was great,” Sheriff Heino said.

As a new leader, Sheriff Heino has one main goal and that’s to be as transparent as possible and to promote Sheriff Heino has created a new role for the Sheriff’s Office – Public Information Officer.

Travis Bruyer, who has been assigned that role, says that social media is a huge help in keeping the public informed.

“What’s great with that is that we can get information out so much quicker, if we’re looking for a lost child or if we have a suspect that we’re looking for and everybody wants to be the eyes and ears,” Bruyer said. “So when that stuff pops up we get great responses.”

With close to 15,000 followers and likes on Facebook Bruyer tell us his goal for this year is to double the Flathead County Sheriff Office’s Facebook page following.

You can keep up to date on the Flathead County’s social media pages by checking out their Twitter feed and their Facebook page.

-Maren Sui reporting for MTN News