There's no such thing as a "City Sheriff"

Age of the Geek Column: The elections are over. Soon across the country we'll be swearing in a new crop of legislators, supervisors, auditors, attorneys, and sheriffs.
Yes, sheriffs.
Take note, Hollywood. Sheriffs are elected officials. They aren't hired by mayors. Nobody brings them in for review. They don't get suspended or fired by the captain. They get voted in and voted out.
Sheriffs are not just another word for "rural police."
It's become my biggest pet peeve in entertainment. Look up practically any movie or TV show set anywhere outside a major city and you'll see it. Horror movies in particular are bad about this as they are often set in rural areas but written by people that have never been to one. You'll see law enforcement officers wearing tan uniforms and starred badges announcing themselves as the local police department. Frustrated sheriffs concerned that the mayor is going to fire them.
You'd think that fictionalized newspapers would be a bigger pet peeve of mine, but the inability of popular culture to distinguish between sheriffs and police are just so much more prevalent. It's everywhere.
The now canceled TV show "Sleepy Hollow" was a particularly frustrating example. The show begins with the local sheriff being killed by the Headless Horseman, leading to his partner, a police detective, to continue his fight against the supernatural. Somehow, the part about the headless ghost is the most plausible thing about that premise.
Deciding that they wanted to have their cake and eat it too, the show's producers regulated the sheriff of Westchester County, the second most populated county in New York, to a one-person operation run out of a tiny office buried in the Sleepy Hollow Police Department, giving them the tropes of the small town sheriff when they wanted them and the drama of a large administrative foil when it was convenient.
Somehow popular culture has become convinced that police departments are large law enforcement organizations while sheriffs are small town cops. In reality, if your story calls for the "small town officer that knows everybody and tries to keep the peace with the mayor breathing down his neck," you're looking for a police chief, not a sheriff.
Personally, I blame Andy Griffith. The fictional Sheriff Andy Taylor worked the jail and courthouse, but was also subservient to the mayor and rarely ventured out of the town. Probably for the best because, with just him and his cousin to keep the peace, Mayberry County must have been a lawless wildland once you got past the city limits.
So let's recap.
Sheriffs are county officials, elected by voters. Police chiefs are city employees, hired by the city.
Sheriff's deputies are responsible for county-wide law enforcement, along with serving court orders and transporting prisoners.
Police officers are responsible for city-wide law enforcement, which includes enforcing city ordinances.
Deputies will summon you to court. Police will tell you to mow your lawn.
Yes, there is a lot of overlap, but they are not interchangeable. Deputies will summon you to court. Police will tell you to mow your lawn.
Amazingly enough, of all things, the Resident Evil franchise has been able to get this distinction right. One of the main protagonists of "Resident Evil 2" is Leon Kennedy, a newly hired officer with the Raccoon City Police Department who objectively has the worst first day on the job ever.
In the upcoming remake of the game, Leon encounters a deputy with the Arklay County Sheriff's Department. Where Leon wears police blue, the ill-fated deputy wears sheriff tan. Where Leon is clearly identified as working for the fictional city, the deputy is likewise identified as working for the fictional county.
The director of "Resident Evil 2" doesn't even speak English, but is apparently more capable of accurately portraying law enforcement in the United States than your average American horror producer.
Travis Fischer is a news writer for Mid-America Publishing and don't even get him started on what pop culture thinks school principals do…