FARMINGTON — Franklin County Sheriff-elect Scott Nichols Sr. became intrigued with law enforcement while he was in school.

In the 1970s a Maine State Police trooper came to a school he was attending in Turner to drop off career information to a guidance counselor.

At the time, Nichols said he was too afraid to talk to the trooper but he listened in on what he was talking to fellow students about. He liked what he heard.

“I was impressed with his demeanor,” Nichols, 51, of New Sharon said Thursday. So much so that after graduating from Mt. Blue High School in Farmington, he joined the Army to be a military police officer.

“I knew I would either like it or I wouldn’t like it,” he said. “I liked it.”

Nichols doesn’t come from a law enforcement background in his family like many police officers.

He continued to pursue a law enforcement career and was accepted into the Maine State Police in 1984.

“I never looked at police officers in an adversarial sense. Some people, for their own personal reasons, have a negative outlook at law enforcement personnel — not all — but they do exist. I just never felt that way about the police,” Nichols said. “I look at police as a job for good.”

It is about helping people, he said.

Nichols is a retired state trooper and who has been police chief of Carrabassett Valley the past five years. He has been in law enforcement for about 28 years, not counting military service or the one year he spent in Iraq as an adviser to the Iraq National Police.

He and wife, Lorna, have been married more than 27 years and have spent the past 25 years in New Sharon. They have two children, Scott Jr. and Katelyn, both veterans of the Iraq and Afghanistan conflicts.

Adrian Harris of New Sharon will swear Nichols in as sheriff at 2 p.m. Sunday, Dec. 30, at the family’s Nichols Top of the Grill & BBQ on Route 2 in New Sharon.

Nichols begins his four-year term as sheriff on New Year’s Day.

His salary will be $58,154, county Clerk Julie Magoon said. He currently is paid $63,288, Carrabassett Valley Town Manager Dave Cota said.

“Obviously, I didn’t do this for personal gain,” Nichols said.

He thinks it is important that the county and other law enforcement agencies move further into the 21st Century and work more as a team.

“We do pretty good here as it is, but I think we can do better,” he said.

He believes it is the Sheriff’s Department’s role to assist other agencies, not to take over, but to work with them as a team.

He’s ready to become sheriff.

It has been the longest 16 weeks since the election, he said.

He has been working with incoming Carrabassett Valley police Chief Mark Lopez.

Nichols has also been meeting with county officials to get on top of what his new job entails.

It will be a relief to only have to worry about one place, he said, referring to working with Lopez and county officials.

He plans to meet with the Franklin County commissioners at their meeting at 9 a.m. Wednesday, Jan. 2, in the commissioners’ office. He plans to lay out his plans for the Sheriff’s Department to see if they approve.

If they do, he’ll be posting an in-house advertisement to create a second patrol lieutenant. He will follow the formal interview process for the position.

Nichols will move into the office that Chief Deputy Raymond Meldrum currently has.

Meldrum has been chief deputy with Sheriff Dennis Pike for 12 years. Pike lost his bid for re-election in November. Meldrum is leaving the Department.

Nichols’ chief deputy is Steven Lowell of Rangeley, currently a sergeant with the Sheriff’s Department.

Pike will remain as a reserve deputy, Nichols said.

Nichols plans to be in the office Monday through Friday. If he is not there, he will be out on patrol or doing other duties, he said.

dperry@sunjournal.com

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