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The Survey Says: What More and More Communities are Relying on For Feedback During The Search for Their Next Police Chief

A couple of weeks ago, I wrote about common processes used to hire police chiefs today.  In that post, I touched on some of the public methods being used.  While doing my research for that post, I ran across some survey instruments being used during these public processes.  I thought it would be helpful to examine a few of them. Some of the surveys have a deadline on their availability due to the timeliness of the information.  If you happen to read this at a later point in the future and the link to one of the surveys doesn’t work, I apologize. General Information Eugene, Oregon is close to selecting their next police chief.  On March 13th, they will hold a community panel with selected community members.  A community forum open to the public will follow the panel discussion.  Feedback and input can be submitted via email at epcrecruit@ci.eugene.or.us Many police chief searches today solicit input from citizens through a similar process using a dedicated email address. Surveys About Community Expectations of Next Chief While searching for their next police chief, the County of Albemarle designed a survey instrument on their website seeking input from the public with six specific…

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charles ramsey

Police Leadership Through Quotes of Chief Charles Ramsey

I thought it would be a great idea to write about a number of successful police chiefs across the country and provide their view of law enforcement and leadership.  What better way to do that than through their quotes.  The first guinea pig for this project is Chief Charles Ramsey. Most aspiring law enforcement leaders are probably familiar with Chief Charles Ramsey.  For those leaders that are not familiar, let me provide some of his background. BACKGROUND Chief Charles Ramsey started his career with the Chicago Police Department.  He join the department in 1968 and spent 30 years with the department, rising to the rank of Deputy Superintendent before retiring in 1998. After his retirement, Chief Charles Ramsey was appointed Chief of the Metropolitan Police Department of the District of Columbia until 2007.  In 2008, he became Chief of the Philadelphia Police Department until his retirement in 2016. Chief Ramsey graduated from the FBI National Academy.  He has his undergraduate and graduate degrees from Lewis University.  Chief Ramsey has served as President of the Police Executive Research Forum as well as the Major Cities Chiefs Association.  In 2014, President Obama selected Chief Ramsey to serve as Co-Chair of the President’s…

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Common Processes Used to Hire a Police Chief

I use the word "common" loosely since the process used to hire a police chief varies dramatically from city to city. You might say the process shifts like sand in the sea from opening to opening, but that would probably be a little too much hyperbole. Anyway, l have participated in several different hiring processes in the last 10-15 years. I have also observed the shift in methods used from a strictly internal approach to a more public process in the last several years. Small, medium and large police departments can use different processes. Listed below are the typical processes used to hire a police chief. By no stretch of the imagination does this list cover the breadth of possibilities. A list such as that would take an entire book. Instead, I have tried to include the most common approaches. Internal Process By far, this is the most common process. I would even call it the traditional approach. The process works like this. They advertise the position and collect resumes. The hiring officials sift through the applications and narrow them down to 8-12 applicants to participate in the interview process. The City Manager or Mayor, depending on who the hiring…

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