Eddie Engram, elected Sonoma County’s first Black sheriff, wants focus on ‘the job that I do’

As his plane touched down on the tarmac at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport, Eddie Engram turned his cellphone on to a deluge of voicemails and text messages congratulating him on his victory in the race for Sonoma County sheriff.

It was June 21, two weeks after Election Day and the slow trickle of ballot counts that had Engram on a razor’s edge between a runoff and winning outright the sheriff’s post in his first run for public office after more than two decades in law enforcement.

Engram had spent most of that time off the grid on a fishing trip in Alaska, the unresolved outcome weighing on him roughly 3,000 miles away.

As he waited to disembark the plane in Seattle for his connecting flight home, he turned to his friends.

“Oh, I guess I won,” he said.

It was an anticlimactic finish to one of the most competitive races on the ballot, and one of the most dynamic contests for Sonoma County sheriff in the past three decades.

But Engram’s victory, with 50.34% of the 125,806 votes in the three-way race, was historic. Engram, a current assistant sheriff, is the first Black person to fill the seat of sheriff in Sonoma County — and the first Black elected county official in local history.

Engram campaigned on his 20 years of experience at the Sheriff’s Office, including leadership amid wildfire disasters and his years overseeing the internal affairs division and county jails.

On the campaign trial, he told would-be voters that his experience as a person of color gives him a unique view into the criminal justice system. But he has also stressed repeatedly, including in interviews with The Press Democrat, that he regards his personal identity as peripheral to the election and the job as the county’s top lawman. He prefers to focus on his qualifications.

“It’s an accomplishment. Who knows, maybe I’ll be in Sonoma County’s history books. But that’s not what the election was about. It was about leading the Sheriff’s Office. It was about a desire for change,” Engram said.

“It wasn’t about whether I was going to be the first Black sheriff or elected official.”

Others have touted the milestone, viewing his election as an important step toward greater racial representation and equality in a rapidly changing but still majority white county.

“This election meant so much more for Sonoma County than who was going to lead the Sheriff’s Office for a term. While experience and qualifications should always be at the forefront of voters' minds, the historical significance of electing the second Black sheriff in California history and the first Black sheriff in Sonoma County history cannot be overstated,” said Kevin McGoon, vice president of the Deputy Sheriffs’ Association, which represents rank-and-file members of the Sheriff’s Office.

The union endorsed Engram in the race, as did Sheriff Mark Essick and other law enforcement interest groups.

But some in Sonoma County who have been active on issues of policing and incarceration challenge the premise that having a person of color as sheriff alone is enough to fix inequities in the criminal justice system and the department’s sometimes troubled relationship with local minority communities.

“Just because he’s Black doesn’t mean that’s true progress, and that’s why I want to see the action that comes after the election,” said Abrea Tillman, student body president at Santa Rosa Junior College and incoming vice president of school’s Black Student Union.

“Having a Black person in a position of leadership is important representation — but now we have to make sure the people we have in the positions of leadership are going to act on their word to have a plan that best serves their community.”

Making history

Two days after his apparent victory, Engram wore a T-shirt, blue jeans, Nike mid-tops and a beard that is more salt than pepper as he ordered his usual coffee ‒ black, no cream or sugar.

With the dust settling after his victory, he stopped by Brew coffee shop in downtown Santa Rosa on his way to recycle cans from home and dismantle campaign signs. Later in the day, he would fly south to Disneyland for a much-needed trip with his wife and kids. During the last months of the campaign, which began in September, he became all but a stranger among his loved ones, he lamented.

“I see him more on signs than I see him at home,” Engram recounted his daughter telling his wife at one point.

He held his coffee cup in both hands and described his relief upon learning he had won the race. The feeling has since given way to gratitude for those who volunteered on his campaign.

“There were people who poured their heart and soul into working on my campaign on their own, private time,” he said. “A friend of mine ‒ I joked to his wife that she could have him back now.”

Engram prevailed over rivals Carl Tennenbaum, a retired San Francisco police sergeant, who earned 29.17% of the vote, and retired Sheriff’s Office Capt. Dave Edmonds, who earned 13.18%.

He will take office at the start of next year, the same time as Jim Cooper, a current state Assembly member, who won the race for Sacramento County sheriff. They are two of the three first Black sheriffs in California history.

The state’s first Black sheriff, Charlie Byrd, was elected in 1986 in Siskiyou County and served 16 years.

“It’s something I’m proud of, but it’s also something I worked pretty darn hard for,” Engram said. “It’s historic, it’s important, but I don’t want to be known as, ‘Oh, I’m the Black sheriff.’ I want to be measured on the job that I do as opposed to anything else.”

He avoided the issue of his race on the campaign trail, he said, to ward off accusations he was playing “the race card.”

“If I constantly beat the drum of being the first African American sheriff in Sonoma County’s history and second in the state and on and on and on, then someone was going to criticize me for that, and I would much rather talk about the issues and my qualifications than anything else,” Engram said.

Exodus of Black leaders

Still, the 48-year-old is taking office just months after the county was rocked by an exodus of Black leadership amid allegations of routine racist microaggressions and bias within local government.

“We’ve had so many people leaving,” said Katrina Phillips, head of the Sonoma County Commission on Human Rights, one of the few Black people still leading a county governmental entity.

“I’m hoping that Sheriff Engram doesn’t face the same problems.”

Engram doesn’t anticipate he’ll be bothered by such behavior and bias.

“I have a lot of experience dealing with adversity in all sorts of ways. And I don’t think that any aggression, be it micro or macro, is going to make a difference for me in how I do my job,” he said.

Economic Development Board Executive Director Sheba Person-Whitley resigned in November just as Derrick Neal, the county’s choice to take over the Department of Health Services, backed out of the appointment. Their departures came about half a year after former Health Services Director Barbie Robinson, who is also Black, resigned to take a similar job in Harris County, Texas.

Engram’s experience and job will make it different for him, he said.

“I think the position that I’m in, as a virtue of my profession, and my lived experience is different than those individuals,” Engram said. “Those positions that we’re talking about, their jobs don’t require them to face conflict on a daily basis. Law enforcement is different. We are required to face conflict on a daily basis, whether it be physical emotional or verbal.”

He added, with a laugh, “Gosh, if you’re going to say something (racist) like that to the sheriff, you’re probably going to have a problem.”

Community reaction

Nelson Pinola, a retired lieutenant who was one of few Native American members at the Sheriff’s Office, is thrilled with Engram’s win.

“It’s important representation, because it’s showing that we are willing to grow,” Pinola said of the county. “When people see a person of color or a woman leading an organization, they see somebody who actually represents them.”

As an insider at the department himself, he has experienced racism and learned, “I had to be twice as good as the next person, I had to be better than them, in order to be equal to them.”

That’s why he was so “heartbroken” about how the Sonoma County Democratic Party ‒ his party ‒ threw their support behind Tennenbaum, rather than “a highly qualified Black male who spent a lot of his life getting to be where he was going and to be qualified to seek this office,” Pinola said.

Tennenbaum was the only candidate eligible for party endorsement as the sole registered Democrat in the race, according to party officials. Engram is registered as no party preference.

Sonoma County Supervisor Lynda Hopkins, who first endorsed Tennenbaum before co-endorsing Engram in May, called Engram’s election “an exciting opportunity to turn over a new leaf at the Sheriff’s Office, to have new leadership from someone I believe both compassionate and extraordinarily qualified for the position.”

“One thing that has always struck me when I’ve gone into the Sheriff’s Office — they have all the photographs on the wall of all the sheriffs back in the day. Every single one has been a white man, and that’s no longer true as of next year,” Hopkins said.

Others active in police reform were less convinced that Engram will bring progress, but they remained openly hopeful.

Tillman, the junior college student leader, called Engram’s win “reflective of progress and ... very important to see.”

“I’m looking for someone who can not only be representative of the community, but also someone who can get things done,” she added.

“Representation is important but can’t be a replacement for the transparency, public safety and accountability the public has consistently demanded from the Sheriff's Office,” said Kirstyne Lange, a prominent local voice on police reform and a member of the Committee for Law Enforcement Accountability Now.

“Communities of color have consistently reported a culture of racism and misogyny within the ranks of (the Sheriff’s Office). Sheriff Engram should make a culture shift a top priority.”

Engram acknowledges the need for more diversity among the ranks of his agency and a better model for community relations. But he also challenges the premise that the Sheriff’s Office is struggling with racial issues.

“You have to admit that not all policing of people of color has to do with it being racially motivated,” Engram said. “Are there some racist cops? Absolutely. But just because a cop is pulling over someone who is Black or Latino doesn’t necessarily mean that the reason for that stop is racist.

“It’s really hard to get that next generation interested in law enforcement when the community, especially communities of color, hear all these negative things about law enforcement.”

Phillips, the Human Rights Commission chair, said the election of a Black official “means there are a lot of people whose minds have been opened a little bit more.”

As he prepares to take office, she said, “I really hope that he meant what he said when he said he really wanted to actually improve the system.”

Getting to work

The day after a long Election night that dragged past midnight, Engram said he slept in until 1 p.m.

The nine months of campaigning were “extremely draining,” he said. After returning home from work, he said, “I’d go home and change, then I’d be out at a debate or out at an event. … There were weeks where I was doing something five nights a week.”

But the campaign reaffirmed how hard he can push himself, he said. He had been preparing for the political grind his whole life without meaning to, with hard work ingrained as a personal value and a survival mechanism in childhood.

He recalled an experience on his elementary school playground in Florida, when a white classmate called him the N-word, leading to a fight. He was suspended for the incident. The white child was not.

“Later on, I’d have a conversation with my mom and tell her what happened, and she goes, ‘You’re just going to have to live with that,’” Engram said.

"Throughout my whole life, that’s what I was told ... that, you know, life isn’t going to be fair for Black people, especially Black men. It’s just not going to be, and you’re going to have to work twice as hard to succeed. Whether that’s been true in every situation or not really never mattered to me, because that’s just how I live my life.“

That early experience also showed him “you can’t allow the words that people say or the things that people do to make you not be the person that you are.”

He took that lesson — to be focused, intentional and unswayed — to heart, he said.

“I’ve been very purposeful about my career,” he said. “I wasn’t going to be led astray in any way to do something that I didn’t want to do just for the sake of doing it, or that’s what people thought I should do, or that’s how my career was going to be charted.”

That integrity will be important in his upcoming role, he said. Come January, he’ll lead an agency with nearly 700 employees and an operating budget of over $195 million.

Engram and Essick agreed they expect a smooth transfer of power.

“Sheriff-elect Engram and I will spend the next six months working closely together to ensure he is well-informed and prepared to take office in January,” Essick said in a statement.

Engram plans immediate promotions and policy changes, some collaborative and some unilateral, though he remains tight-lipped about what those entail.

“I don’t think it’s fair to give that answer to the press before I have that conversation with members of the staff,” Engram said.

Hopkins said she was excited for Engram to get to work. Her dual endorsement of Engram came after she saw him present on budget issues and witnessed “his command of the information, his clear ability to research what’s happening in other counties to share that information in real time.”

Engram, sidestepping specifics, said he plans to focus most on the Sheriff’s Office’s community relationships and would soon make clear “what my expectations are.”

“First and foremost as sheriff, your responsibility is to your constituents overall, as a whole. You have to make a decision based on what’s best for them in the context of your job, and you can’t make those decisions based on any other factors,” he said.

“Decisions aren’t made based on friendships — they’re made based on what’s best for the organization and what’s best for Sonoma County.”

You can reach Staff Writer Emily Wilder at 707-521-5337 or emily.wilder@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter @vv1lder.