Santa Barbara County Sheriff’s Benevolent Posse Elects Sean Koffel of Montecito as New President

Santa Barbara, CA (April 19, 2023) — Sean Koffel of Montecito has been elected President of the Santa Barbara County Sheriff’s Benevolent Posse Board of Directors.

The Posse Board also re-elected Richard Kline of Los Alamos as Board Chairman and elected David Baskett of Santa Maria as Treasurer; Marianne Freeman of Santa Barbara as Secretary; and Dana Mazzetti of Montecito, Jay Gerlach of Santa Barbara, and Suzanne Kramer-Morton of Sant Ynez as Vice Presidents.

Sean Koffel grew up in San Francisco and attended University of Arizona. Following graduation, and 9/11 he joined the U.S. Marine Corps Officer Program. He was commissioned in 2005 and served two deployments overseas during four years of active-duty service with the 1^st Marine Division. After returning home to California, he received an MBA at Stanford Business School and worked at Morgan Stanley in New York before starting an entrepreneurial career and building several companies in the adult beverage, consumer products and consumer technology industries. He is currently Co-Founder and Managing Partner of Watchfire Ventures, a Venture Capital firm based in Santa Barbara and San Francisco, which he started with his partner in 2019. Sean and his wife Jenna reside in Montecito with their three children.

The Santa Barbara County Sheriff’s Benevolent Posse is a 501(c)(3) organization which was formed by local citizens to seek ways to help the Sheriff’s Office maintain their current efficiency, improve their performance, morale and effectiveness as well as to seek innovative solutions to the increasingly complex problems faced by local law enforcement. The Sheriff’s Posse Board is comprised of local non-law enforcement volunteers who donate their time, and efforts to the assist the Sheriff’s Office fill its needs not funded by the constrained County budget.

The Posse also works to enhance relations between the community and County law enforcement, promote public safety through special events and activities, and serve as a citizen-initiated conduit for informing the community about public safety issues.

In the recent past the Sheriff’s Posse has helped the Sheriff’s Office obtain much needed emergency equipment including COVID-19 personal protection equipment, protective vests, night vision goggles, specialized weapons, computer equipment, drug sniffing and patrol/tracking/bomb/explosive detection dogs, a headquarters barn for its Mounted Enforcement Unit and specialized equipment for the dive team It has also supported the highly effective DARE program in north county elementary schools teaching students to develop good decision-making skills and understanding of the harmful effects of substance abuse, bullying and violence.

The Sheriff’s Posse is holding a “Funraising” event at Red River Ranch in Los Olivos on Saturday, May 13 to help raise funds for urgent Sheriff’s Office needs not covered by the constrained county budget.

For more information about the Santa Barbara County Sheriff’s Benevolent Posse, visit its website at www.sbsheriffsposse.org.