JACKSON, Mich. — The effort to remove Jackson County Sheriff Steve Rand has fallen short.
Dean Schuette, the man leading the recall effort, said he was unable to collect enough petition signatures to get the issue on the ballot.
Schuette is the father of the sheriff's lieutenant who is suing Sheriff Rand in federal court.
Rand was recorded making derogatory comments about women and minorities. The tapes were released as part of the lawsuit filed against him by Lt. Tommy Schuette. Rand admitted making the comments and apologized for them.
The Board of State Canvassers. approved Dean Schuette's recall petition on Nov. 26, 2018. The approval gave Schuette six months to collect more than 15,000 signatures during a 60-day window.
Schuette started collecting signatures collecting signatures for his recall petition on Dec. 10.
But after the 60-day window expired, Schuette only collected around 7,000 signatures.
"The biggest problem is we checked with the malls and shopping centers and stores and nobody allowed us in for political reasons," says Schuette.
"It kind of put us in a bind and the weather turned bad and then came Christmas, we collected about seven-thousand signatures but that's nowhere near enough."
According to the Board of State Canvassers, Schuette can try again to collect signatures again, as long as it is done during a 60-day period before six months have passed.
"So the next thing we're going to start a billboard campaign, starting in the early spring, sometime in March. And also by the middle of April, we'll start back end once the outdoor activities start and we can go to different venues and collect larger amounts of signatures," says Schuette.
The Jackson County Board of Commissioners stripped Rand of his benefits when he refused to resign in April.
The only ways to force him out are a recall or by getting the governor to remove him from office.
Back in February, county leaders asked then-Governor Rick Snyder to do just that.
Snyder referred the case to the Attorney General's Office, but no decision has been made as of October 8th.
