NEW ORLEANS — The sheriff’s race is one of the more contentious items on the Dec. 11 ballot in New Orleans. It pits a four-term incumbent against a self-proclaimed criminal justice reformer.
Marlin Gusman, 66, has held the job for the past 17 years. His opponent former New Orleans Independent Police Monitor Susan Hutson, 54, is running for an elected position for the first time.
The job’s main responsibility is to run the sprawling Orleans Parish Correctional Center.
The candidates differ on whether to build another jail to house inmates with mental health issues, known as the Phase III building.
Gusman has said the new building is necessary to make needed improvements to inmates' medical care.
“An important part of the long-term solution to the lack of compliance with the consent judgment in the areas of medical and mental health,” Gusman said in a written statement.
The Orleans Parish jail has been under a federal consent decree since 2013. It calls for sweeping changes at a jail complex notorious for inmate violence, frequent escapes, poor mental health care and inmate deaths.
Hutson said Phase III would be a $51 million white elephant. She backs Mayor LaToya Cantrell’s idea of renovating part of the existing central jail to accommodate inmates with health problems.
Hutson casts herself as the progressive alternative in the race, like newly elected Orleans District Attorney Jason Williams who endorsed her. She is promising to reform the criminal justice system.
During the campaign, she has accused Gusman of running an unsafe, unconstitutional jail
She told WWL radio, “I don’t believe the employees, including all of the deputies, are valued at OPSO,” said Huston. “They are not trained appropriated, paid appropriately, and not allowed to be a part of the solution. If they were, this consent decree would be done by now.”
Gusman accuses Hutson of aligning her campaign with “people whose real interests are to defund law enforcement and abolish jail and arrests.”
If elected, Hutson would be the first female sheriff in New Orleans.
Gusman touts his experience in government as the city's chief administrative officer for former Mayor Marc Morial and a term on the city council prior to becoming sheriff.
Hutson is an attorney and Tulane Law School graduate.
Gusman got 48 %of the vote during the November primary. He needed more than 50 % to avoid a runoff.
Hutson received 35% in a field of 5 candidates.