WALKER — Cass County Sheriff Bryan Welk was reelected Tuesday, Nov. 3, defeating challenger Deputy Aaron Ammerman.
County Board incumbent Neal Gaalswyk will also return to office in District 1, while challenger Tyler Seifert toppled incumbent Scott D. Bruns in District 4. Aaron Young won the District 3 seat on the Board left vacant by the death of Commissioner Rusty Lilyquist, who died in February.
Welk has worked in the office for 28 years, beginning as a dispatcher and later serving as a deputy, sergeant, lieutenant and chief deputy for former Sheriff Tom Burch.
Ammerman has been a Cass County deputy for 22 years. He and Welk attended high school and law enforcement training together and have known each other for 35 years.
The race between the two has been highly contentious in the wake of a complaint against Welk involving the disclosure of internal investigation materials filed in January by Ammerman.
The deputy accused his boss of showing sexually explicit photographs of a naked woman and video of a nude man inside a jail cell to people who should not have seen them. Ammerman said retaliation he experienced months after he became a whistleblower motivated him to run for sheriff.
Welk publicly stated for the first time in a video posted Oct. 17 that the allegations are “false.”
“Data practices laws prevent me from talking about the specifics of these situations, and I want to assure you that these decisions needed to be made," Welk said. "I’ve never inappropriately disclosed protected information to people who did not need to know.”
Ammerman responded and said he offered to take a polygraph examination.
Sandra Burch, 56, of Remer, said she grew up with both candidates. She declined to share who she voted for but said he was a good friend of her brother's and she knew his character.
"It's almost embarrassing. It's sad," Burch said of the controversy in the small town. " ... Everybody has such strong opinions one way or another, and it's horrible because it comes down to character assassination."
Cass County has maintained the documents detailing the complaint and investigation are private data in response to multiple KAXE data requests.
KAXE is asking a court to compel Cass County to comply with the Minnesota Government Data Practices Act. A data practices complaint was filed Oct. 21 with the Court of Administrative Hearings.
The complaint details Cass County’s decision to designate elected officials as employees for the purposes of public data classification.
Commissioner races
County Commissioner District 1 includes the cities of East Gull Lake, Lake Shore and Pillager. Gaalswyk, 71, was first elected in 2011 and is a former law enforcement officer.
District 3 includes the cities of Backus, Hackensack and Chickamaw Beach.
District 4 includes the cities of Longville, Remer and Walker.
