Law Enforcement

According to Valley County Sheriff Vernon Buerkle, the jail had a dramatic reduction in the number of inmates over the past week. The number of beds filled dropped by a total of 27 from a recent high of 50 down to just 35. The bulk of the reduction came as a result of Department of Corrections activity and inmate transfers.

The Valley County Health Department and the Sheriff’s Office have added an incinerator to their toolkit for collecting and destroying illegal and prescription drugs. A red drug collection box has been placed in the county courthouse for people to drop prescriptions that are no longer in use. At press time, the Health Department’s Connie Boreson confirmed that an initial test of a new drug incinerator held in coordination with the Sheriff’s Office on Oct. 24 was successful, making it possible moving forward to both collect and destroy unused drugs here in the county without sending materials out for disposal.