I found Eric Ferrell’s letter about selecting the new Peachtree City police chief to be interesting, especially when coupled with the story about the decision to have a cross-section of citizens interviewing potential candidates.
I think that the city should look both within and outside the department, including the exceptionally qualified officers that were forced out of the department by Chief Clark and others that left much earlier for other law enforcement jobs in the corporate or government sectors.
I also think that members of the citizens’ panel should have some background in law enforcement or the military to enable them to make a solid assessment of the candidates and to pick a new chief who is an operationally oriented leader who truly listens to his officers and not a bureaucratic manager who only wants people in the department who nod their heads (in the military we had a more descriptive term, but it would be inappropriate for print).
The bottom line is that we definitely need a chief that will serve the city in a totally unselfish manner and stem the exodus of other excellent officers from the department.
James Kelso
Lt Col USAF (Ret)
Peachtree City, Ga.
