YAKIMA, Wash. - Yakima's next police chief will arrive in a city with a high-profile gang and crime problem to take over a department that's spent the last several years embroiled in personnel problems. On top of all that, budget problems mean the agency is short by at least a half-dozen officers.
Who wants the job?
Nearly 30 candidates applied from across the country following an advertising period that lasted about six weeks and ended Nov. 14. Nineteen were selected for further review.
A consultant and City Manager Don Cooper will narrow that list before selecting finalists to bring to town, tentatively set for January. Cooper said he is on track to announce the pick early next year, with hopes of the finalist starting by spring.
Key attributes for the next chief will be an ability to find new ways to approach the city's gang and crime problems and a willingness to smooth the waters with the rank and file.
"If you can't get along with your employees, it's very hard to get anything done," Cooper said in explaining the importance of labor relations to the post, often the most visible next to the city manager for a community.
The city's posting on the website for the Washington Association of Sheriffs and Police Chiefs sums up the complexity of the job in two rather long sentences.
"Yakima seeks a highly respected, seasoned and accomplished law enforcement executive with significant career experience with traditional community/problem-oriented policing within a multi-cultural environment, youth-gang intervention and suppression initiatives and management/labor relations. The successful candidate will be a mature leader, consensus builder and active listener who values the opportunity to take a good department to a new level of growth and service delivery."
Only half-joking, Cooper summed up the description this way: "Superman."
The Granato Years
The department's last chief, Texan Sam Granato, arrived in 2003. He was the first "outsider" to run the department in several decades. Granato's predecessor, Don Blesio, retired in 2002 after spending the last seven years of his 37-year Yakima tenure as police chief.
Blesio replaced Pleas Green, who was promoted from captain to chief and served 12 years before moving to lead the Kirkland Police Department in 1995. The late Jack LaRue spent 30 years with the department, the last 11 as chief.
Granato got off to a positive start -- launching a gang unit and assigning lower- priority calls to civilian workers among several well-received initiatives.
But his relationship with union leaders quickly soured as he developed a reputation for favoring some officers while targeting others. The result was a tangle of lawsuits and personnel cases -- some dismissed, others settled and at least one on appeal. In the most notable case, involving a fired officer who said he had become a pawn in the drug-testing debate, Granato was found by a state labor panel not to have retaliated.
"I think everybody is ready to move past that," said Sgt. Mike Costello, president of the Yakima Police Patrolman's Association.
When Cooper met with the union board and other officers, Costello said, the consensus seemed to be that they didn't favor any particular sort of candidate, just one who would agree to work together with the officers.
Costello said he thought it was the first time a city manager had directly consulted with the officers during the hiring process.
Granato's critics say a lack of familiarity with Washington's union rules was one of the big reasons that he encountered trouble while trying to make changes, which included a proposal to begin random drug testing of officers.
Washington's system of collective bargaining requires public employers to bargain with workers over wages and working conditions. Texas and other right-to-work states give employers more flexibility, particularly in the area of wages.
Granato maintained that his difficulties had more to do with personal attacks against him by union leaders, a charge that former union president Bob Hester, who has since retired, steadfastly denied.
An outside review branded many of his top commanders as disloyal. Granato meanwhile brought in a deputy chief to specialize in day-to-day operations, but he faced a no-confidence vote and left in two years amid reports that he had been asked to retire.
Granato left the department in January, accepting $100,000 in exchange for a promise not to sue the city. His interim replacement, Capt. Greg Copeland, has said he does not want the permanent post. Copeland said the relatively short tenure for modern chiefs -- five to seven years -- does not fit his career plan.
Cooper said internal candidates remain in the mix, but he declined to identity them or any other applicants. Because of the sensitivity of job searches, cities often delay releasing names until both sides have agreed they are interested in a possible hire.
Limited applicants
Cooper said the number of applicants was a little lighter than he had hoped for, but not necessarily unexpected.
Kim Kohlepp of the International Association of Chiefs of Police, which handles executive searches for a variety of agencies around the country, said chiefs appear to be changing jobs less often during the economic slowdown.
Don Pierce, executive director for the Washington Association of Sheriffs and Police Chiefs, said the rocky relationship between Granato and the union could play a role in whether the best candidates decided to apply.
"If they see it as a suicide mission, they're not going to come," Pierce said.
Cooper's newness as city manager, however, is a plus, something that applicants would see as an opportunity for the system to reset its tone.
Without knowing the details of Yakima's situation, Pierce suggested that a strong chief could find his or her footing and re-establish positive ties with officers.
"It takes two to tango, but the chief's got to open those lines of communication. In a lot of ways the chief often has to go more than halfway," Pierce said.
Cooper said he would look for candidates to spend more time than he first expected in getting to know the community and the police force. He suggested some of the department's past problems may have resulted from Granato's lack of familiarity with Yakima.
"They're going to have to understand the community before they make changes," he said about the next chief.
Northwest candidates may emerge in the lead, partly for that reason, but Cooper did not rule out the prospect of finalists from outside the region.
Agencies in the Tri-Cities went different directions on that point while hiring chiefs this year.
Richland hired Yakima native Chris Skinner this year as its new police chief. He was an assistant chief at the Hillsboro (Ore.) Police Department, where he had previously applied to become chief, according to news reports.
Skinner, who said he is not an applicant for the Yakima job, agreed that coming from Central Washington has helped him settle into the Tri-Cities.
"I think that translates well for a candidate that has an emotional connection to a region or area," Skinner said.
Pasco, on the other hand, hired Sylvania Township, Mich., chief Robert Metzger from a field of 21 candidates across the country.
Pasco City Manager Gary Crutchfield said he was happy with the selection process, although he agreed that it netted fewer candidates than he would have hoped, perhaps because of the slow market.
The police chief is in the best position to reassure the community about how crime is being managed and to establish a tempo for the entire department.
Because of that public impact, the chief is often considered a city's most critical department head, along with the city engineer, Crutchfied said.
"You want to make sure you've got it right," he said.
The next chief will oversee nearly 180 employees, more than 130 of them police officers, and manage a budget of about $22 million. The salary ranges between $99,000 and $121,000.
The final pick rests with Cooper, but he is expected to confer with the City Council before announcing his decision.
Kathy Coffey, chairwoman of the council's public safety committee, said she hopes that everyone involved in the process will keep an open mind on how to move the department ahead. The focus needs to be on overcoming the city's gang problem, she said.
"I would like to see some harmony down there all the way across," Coffey said. "That would be the ideal situation, so we as a community and as YPD can attack this problem."
* Mark Morey can be reached at 509-577-7671 or mmorey@yakimaherald.com.
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