Everywhere Delbert Ewoldt goes, there’s a new sheriff in town.
Ewoldt, an avuncular Andy Griffith in round-rimmed glasses and an ever-present cowboy hat, was elected sheriff in Sedgwick County on Tuesday, the third time he has held that title, in three different communities.
“I just enjoy being sheriff,” he said from his ranch on the windswept plains of northeast Colorado. “My whole career has been kind of groomed toward this.”
Ewoldt served three terms as the popular sheriff of Summit County until he “retired” for the first time in 1994.
But after buying the ranch a few miles south of Julesberg – he picked the location, friends say, because the town has a good bakery – he soon was talked into serving as undersheriff in Sedgwick County.
“It was funny, but when he left Summit County, he said ‘I’m not going to be in law enforcement. I’m going to get a ranch.’ It wasn’t 30 days before he was working for the Sheriff’s Department,” said state Rep. Gary Lindstrom, a friend who served as Ewoldt’s second in command in Summit County.
In 2000, officials just across the border in Chase County, Neb., called to offer him the sheriff’s job as an emergency fill-in.
“He took over, and I think as far as everybody’s concerned, he done a good job,” said Paul Kunnemann, the county emergency manager.
Ewoldt, whose Colorado Hereford ranch sits 13 miles from the Chase County line and 50 miles from the county seat in Imperial, Neb., rented an apartment there but often commuted across the arrow-straight roads that slice through wheat fields.
Back home after the two-year stint, he quickly was recruited by then-sheriff Larry Lust to serve as undersheriff, a position he retained under incumbent Sedgwick County Sheriff Rick Ingwerson.
Although the two have gotten along professionally, Ingwerson can’t match the experience of Ewoldt, a graduate of the FBI law-enforcement academy and a deputy U.S. marshal.
After a group of residents pressed Ewoldt to challenge his boss, he won the August GOP primary. A Democratic opponent dropped out of the race for health reasons but threw his support to Ewoldt, setting up his win Tuesday over a write-in.
Ewoldt, 58, points with delight to the law-enforcement leaders he has helped groom. He hired his two successors in Summit County: current sheriff John Minor and predecessor Joe Morales, who is now the executive director of the state Department of Public Safety.
“I can’t say enough of how proud I am of those guys, so I call them up and give them advice, whether they want it or not,” Ewoldt said.
In Summit County, Ewoldt also brought on Rob Urbach, now the sheriff of Phillips County in northeastern Colorado.
“He’s helped me a lot through my career,” said Urbach.
Although Sedgwick County boasts only about 2,700 residents, it is bisected by Interstate 76 and does see a little crime. There were five assaults, 15 burglaries, 26 thefts and two auto thefts in 2004, the most recent year for which statistics are available.
With his election Tuesday, Ewoldt will be asked to keep that in check.
“He’s a true cop,” Lindstrom said. “He’ll be able to tell his grandchildren: ‘I was the sheriff.’ They’re going to say: ‘Where?’ And he’ll say: ‘Everywhere.”‘
Staff writer Steve Lipsher can be reached at 970-513-9495 or slipsher@denverpost.com.
