The experience, vision, and fortitude to make changes.

Beshai would focus on rehabilitation as Worcester County sheriff

by Lindsay Corcoran

Frank Beshai believes his experience running multi-million dollar corporations with hundreds of employees makes him the logical choice to be Worcester County's next sheriff.

April 24, 2010 - EDITOR'S NOTE: This is fourth in a series of articles profiling candidates for Worcester County Sheriff.

Frank Beshai took a look at the list of the current candidates for Worcester County Sheriff and knew that he had to run for the position that he campaigned for twice before.

“A lot of people have been calling me and encouraging me to do this,” Beshai said. “I put my qualifications against others and I said, ‘I need to do this.’”

Beshai joins an already crowded race, running against fellow Republican and current state Rep. Lew Evangelidis of Holden, and Democrats Thomas Foley, a former Massachusetts State Police colonel, and Holden resident Scot Bove, deputy assistant superintendent for the Worcester County House of Corrections. Independent Keith Nicholas, a Warren resident, and police officer for the UMass Memorial Medical Center's Police Department, is also in the running.

This is Beshai’s third time running for the sheriff position, after 1998 when he ran and nearly won with 40 percent of the vote and 2004 when he had to drop out of the race after being diagnosed with a malignant cancer that he has since overcome.

He said that his experience should speak for itself.

Beshai was educated in the Worcester and Shrewsbury schools and now lives in Worcester.

Beshai has spent the last 30 years running multi-million dollar corporations with hundreds of employees in his consultation business. He has worked 22 years with an organization implementing rehabilitation programs in lockup facilities in 17 states and five countries that maintain a 85 percent success rate.

Beshai noted Evangelidis has never been affiliated with any corrections institution and has not been a part of rehabilitation programs like Beshai has.

“It is too dangerous a place to put someone there who wants to try things out,” Beshai said.

Beshai said the rehabilitation programs he has helped create have been proven successful and will be implemented upon his entering office.

“I would implement programs right away so we would hit the ground running,” Beshai said. “I don’t need to time to figure out what’s not working, I know what doesn’t work.”

He said rehabilitation programs are key since the maximum sentence at the Worcester County Jail is two-and-a-half years and all of the prisoners will be going back out on the streets.

“It’s about safety on our streets,” Beshai said. “How do we want them to come out of jail? Better or worse than when they entered?”

Once elected, he said he would like to reach an agreement with the employees that would make them happy.

“Safe, happy workers are more productive,” said Beshai who said that working with large corporations for so many years has given him the experience to work with employees.

Ultimately, Beshai said he wants to continue much of the good work that has taken place under current Worcester County Sheriff Guy Glodis.

“I wouldn’t be running if Glodis wasn’t stepping down,” Beshai said. “He’s made a lot of changes I ran in 1998 and I’d hate to see the things he’s started go backwards.”