On May 6, the City of Winslow announced its strategy to review the City’s police department, partly in light of the shooting incident that occurred in March and partly to review the organization’s strengths and weaknesses prior to moving into a new era with new leadership.
The strategy has two components; first to contract with an interim manager who will work with the command staff to see that the department continues to function at a high level and observe the operation with an eye on recommending improvements and second, to bring in an organization that will assess our total operation and make recommendations for change with the ultimate goal of permanent improvement of our police force. When that is complete, we will do a nationwide recruitment for a new police chief to serve our community into the future.
So far, we have had the interim director on board for over a month. He is a retired police chief and county sheriff in Arizona, and considered an expert on managing police agencies. Everyone who knows him holds him in the highest regard. He is making a difference already, working with our officers to make changes and improvements. He will be paving the way for the permanent chief, when hired, to succeed in Winslow.
In just a few weeks, the Police Executive Research Forum (PERF), will engage in a thorough examination of the Winslow Police Department. PERF is an organization that hires the highest quality police commanders with experience in all kinds of issues, and their mission is to improve the quality of police officers and police agencies all over the country. They will look at our entire operation, and seek input from a cross-section of the community as they help us to determine what changes we need to make to be a better police agency in the future. We expect to have PERF’s recommendations to implement early in 2017.
This is what we promised we would do, and we are doing it.
Unfortunately, there are a handful of people in our community who can see that we are keeping our promises and moving in a positive direction, but don’t want us to succeed. They want to play the blame game, and tear down our police department, our staff and our mayor and council. They are calling for our resignations, and making threats to oust our mayor and council. We, the people of Winslow, are better than that. We know we have challenges. We know we’re not perfect and must improve, and we are resolved to do it.
Tomorrow, please go out of your way to thank a cop and a firefighter to show your support. When you see the mayor and your council members, thank them for working on positive changes and encourage them to continue despite the loud protests of a handful of people who want our community to sink into mediocrity. And most of all say and do something positive about Winslow, because our attitude and our deeds define who we are, and we are a community of positive people who want Winslow to move forward!
