The Record Newspapers - Hometown News For Orange County, Texas

The 2024 Orange County political races are beginning veteran law enforcement officer Ronald Dischler, who is currently a lieutenant with the Beaumont Police Department, announced he will run for sheriff in the March Republican primary.

Besides his law enforcement background, Dischler is also proud of being an Eagle Scout with a bronze palm.

Dischler has lived in Orange County since 1999 and said he is announcing early "because I've worked all my years in Beaumont not a lot of people here know me. They need to get to know my face."

Current Sheriff Lane Mooney is serving his first four-year term in the position. He ran as a Republican in 2020 and won after Keith Merritt announced he was retiring. His term will end at midnight December 31, 2024.

The only other 2024 candidate who has announced is lawyer Rodney Townsend running for the county court-at-law judge position held by Troy Johnson, who will be retiring at the end of his current term.

Since 2012, Orange County candidates have been running in the Republican primaries with the winners rarely facing a Democrat in the general elections. That means the winner of the Republican primary does not usually have a competitor in November.

Dischler is 65 years old and has 41 years of law enforcement experience in Louisiana and Texas. He been with the Beaumont Police Department for 23 years and is currently the third watch commander of patrol officers.

When he was young, he set a career goal of becoming a sheriff or a police chief. He said the time is now here for him to run for the position because by the time his term will start, he will have worked for Beaumont for 25 years and have 30 years in the pension fund.

Before working for the Beaumont Police Department, Dischler worked for the Longview, Texas, Police Department. He said he had wanted to move to Southeast Texas and work in Beaumont, but BPD at the time had a hiring freeze. So he went to work in Longview until he could get the Beaumont job.

Before Longview, Dischler spent 12 years with the Lafayette Sherif's Office. He said he has worked his way up from a jailer to the patrol commander spot he now holds.

During his long career, he has worked in basically every law enforcement area, including working SWAT, becoming a bomb instructor, working rescue squads, being a crime scene investigator, being on a pistol team, and overseeing the sheriff's armory and inventory.

Dischler is married and has grown children and grown stepchildren. He and his wife, Janelle, live on 10 acres of land off FM 1442 in the Mauriceville area. He is a member of the Cowboy Church of Orange County and will be working security this weekend at the CCOC's rodeo at T2 Arena.

He won't be competing in rodeo events, though, even though he rode in rodeos in high school. In his spare time now, he likes to hunt and fish, or play golf.