Government Relations Manager

Ryan Burris

Ryan Burris is about to move to a new desk, he’s been working at the same one since he joined the Department seven and a half years ago. 

The Assistant to the Sheriff is moving into a new office and a new job; Manager of Government Relations.

Ryan came to the Department from Disney, where he worked as a tour guide and later as lead writer for Guest Communications. At Disney he ensured that letters to guests and others contained a consistent message.

He joined the Department as a Staff Writer and worked directly for the Sheriff. His job was to help write speeches and communications for the Sheriff and others in Administration. 

His first assignments included assisting in composing the Sheriff’s commencement speeches for graduates at Vanguard University and California State University at Fullerton. The Fullerton assignment had special meaning; it is Ryan’s alma mater.

The move from Disney to the Orange County Sheriff’s Department was a challenging one for Ryan. He had no experience in law enforcement and had no friends or family in law enforcement. Like so many outside of law enforcement, Ryan took the work of Deputies for granted.

He learned a lot working for the Sheriff. He came to understand just how vast and complicated the Department was, with thousands of employees and more than 20 divisions. Ryan came to realize a commitment that runs 24-hours a day, seven days a week.

He stopped taking what the Deputies did for granted.

It was in his role as staff writer that he first had contact with the Orange County Board of Supervisors and he received some on-the-job training for the role he is about to assume for the Department.

He was assigned to prepare presentations for the Sheriff to deliver to the Board of Supervisors and before long that role grew to include his becoming a liaison between the Department and the Board.

Ryan has his share of foibles, but the one most worth mentioning is his penchant for playing Christmas music all year long, especially in the summer. He finds that he can annoy those around him more effectively that way.

In 2006, his role grew to include dealing with the media.  He became the Department’s chief spokesperson on the coverage of the death of inmate John Chamberlain.

In that role he learned about stakeholder relations, how to deal with the media and county officials in a scenario as controversial as any the Department had ever faced.

He was confronted with distrust of the Department both by the media and county officials from outside the Department.

It was to meet this distrust that he implemented what he feels is one of his greatest contributions to the Department: this very Blog.

The Blog was designed to give the Department a means to get its message out to the public without being filtered by the press or Department critics. The Blog has grown in popularity and often gets more than 100,000 page views a month. It was emulated this month by the Anaheim Police Department, which started its own Blog.

In recent months, Ryan has plunged into the realm of social media, creating a Facebook page for the Sheriff and personally Twittering key Department events as they happen. 

He finds that despite the appointment of Sheriff Sandra Hutchens who promised honesty and transparency, despite the hard work of good and honest people who make up the vast majority of the Department, there remains distrust of the Department by many elected officials.  Ryan said that trust is something that has to be earned and re-establishing trust after it has been lost is no easy task.  

This is the task he has agreed to take on in his new job.  There has been a good deal of improved credibility with the new Sheriff and a Department that had a long and proud history before the scandals of the last few years. There is a long way to go before the Department regains the respect it once had.

Ryan said he is proud to have been Assistant to the Sheriff during a time of transition, to launch a new era of transparency and to ensure that the shortcomings of the previous administration are never repeated.  The men and women of the Orange County Sheriff’s Department who upheld their honor during the time of trouble deserve no less.  

It has been a time of re-connecting with the community and reestablishing links to those we serve and those who help us serve the public.

As Manager of Government relations Ryan will work to expand his contacts to include state legislators and members of Congress who represent Orange County. He is planning a conference for staff of state legislators and members of Congress to open new lines of communication that will help ensure that the Department has the support it needs to fulfill it’s responsibilities to protect the public.

Ryan sees his new task as getting out the message of what it is the Department does, to make sure that the public and those who represent the public do not do what he once did: take law enforcement for granted.