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Eight Amarillo citizens attended a public meeting on Monday evening set up by Public Sector Search & Consulting Inc., the recruitment firm hired by the City of Amarillo to help select the next Amarillo Police Department chief. Amarilloans were invited to provide input on what they hoped to see in a new police chief by attending the meeting and by participating in an anonymous online survey, which Search Consultant Justin Doll said would remain open through the end of the week.
“This has been part of our process of trying to engage with the citizens and to build up a brochure – what are the expectations, the hopes of this future Chief of Police?” Deputy City Manager Andrew Freeman said. “We don’t even have a draft job description yet. We’re waiting on all this feedback, and we’ve had some good feedback in the survey.”
Doll, who led the meeting, said he was a retired Chief of Police from Anchorage, Alaska. Their firm specializes in Chief of Police searches, and there were only three or four people who worked there – all retired chiefs.
“We do this engagement at the beginning of all of our searches, or some form of it, and I think it’s the most important part of the search process is hearing from the community, hearing from the leadership team, hearing from people inside the police department, and really get to understand what they need out of their next chief,” Doll said.
Doll then asked the room what they thought the next Chief of Police needed to be successful in Amarillo. Initial responses from the small crowd included a desire for transparency and community involvement.
“I like to describe that in a chief candidate, or an acting chief, as somebody who’s genuine and authentic, right? Somebody you can walk up to and talk to and feel comfortable that they are listening to what you have to say,” Doll said in response.
The discussion then moved to the idea of an outside candidate versus a candidate promoted to the position from within. Those who spoke initially were in favor of hiring a candidate from Amarillo who knows the community and understands the inner workings of the APD. However, there was also a hesitance to hire what some gathered called “a good ol’ boy.”
“If we have folks that know the problems of the City but aren’t meaningfully addressing them, that’s maybe worse than having someone from the outside address the blind spots,” one citizen said.
One citizen mentioned the culture at the APD, and worried hiring from within would perpetuate a culture they viewed as harmful. Another citizen worried that the “thin blue line culture” at the APD was preventing people from speaking out about problems inside the department.
“We’ve got a thin blue line literally painted in the street in front of the police department here, and that’s a signal to all of the citizens in this community,” one citizen said.
Doll said he tried not to get too tied up on whether the candidate should come from inside or outside the department, but was instead focused on what the right candidate could bring to the department.
“This is very normal. All police agencies, all communities, when we have a discussion, there’s always a lot of this talk about outside versus inside,” Doll said. “And you’re right. There are a lot of pros and cons, but I think it can be helpful to kind of stick to what do we need to see from that person, wherever they’re from?”
The discussion continued for just over an hour. Citizens said they wanted the next chief to bring education and awareness of national trends. They raised concerns about partnerships with federal law enforcement agencies, like ICE, and their reluctance to see the National Guard in Amarillo.
“We don’t want to see local police be surrogate ICE agents. We don’t want the National Guard coming in here and taking over our local police department, and we don’t want FBI troops and agents coming in here and acting like local police,” one citizen said. “Those are real issues, and we need a chief of police that understands that’s not acceptable in this community.”
Representatives from local nonprofits Andrea’s Project and Amarillo Housing First wanted a chief who was accessible and open to talking about the unhoused population.
“Last time I looked at Police Scorecard, it has been a couple years, we’re one of the lowest-rated cities in the State of Texas for being able to address violent crime or sexual assaults,” one citizen said. “So, I think whatever police chief we have, we should be harassing the unhoused a lot less and going through and dealing with violent crimes a lot more.”
When the meeting concluded, Freeman told the Amarillo Tribune that once the COA has finished collecting public feedback, the firm will launch a nationwide search.
“Basically, we’ll have it up for about 30 days as those applicants come in and start to vet them to the brochure, see what they kind of look like,” Freeman said. “[Doll will] probably make some phone calls, ask them some questions, and from there he will narrow down a list of what he would recommend. He’ll share all of them with us, but he’ll recommend a like a top ten or so.”
From there, Freeman said they would likely interview seven candidates virtually until they narrow down the field to four or five candidates that they will actually bring to Amarillo for in-person interviews. Freeman said in an interview following a city council meeting in June that the goal was to have the new chief hired by the end of the year, or January at the latest.
“We’ll have more public engagement where the public can come out and meet with them, ask them questions, and hopefully compare back to these meetings. Are we bringing in candidates that meet those expectations?” Freeman said. “And then after that meeting, they’ll be able to provide some feedback, as well. And then we’re also hoping city management will do interviews, but we’re also going to try to have some stakeholder committees that just ask some questions. Not to rank or interview per se, but to provide us feedback similar to this process.”
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