“I’ve been to a lot of different venues, I’ve seen a lot of different law enforcement across this country,” Chief Tim George says,”and I will challenge any of those jurisdictions person to person, case to case, workload to workload.”
In Chief George’s time at MPD, he’s seen as many as 6 people claim the role of top cop, and another 5 as City Manager. He says change is evident, but the department will be just fine.
“You get new bosses,” Chief George says, “but the mission doesn’t change, our core values on the wall don’t change.”
Chief George says it’s likely he would have stayed on another year, but changes to the Public Employees Retirement System, or PERS, including updates to the mortality table, forced his hand.
“They were suggesting I was going to live longer, and so they were going to pay me less over a longer period of time,” George says, “but my crystal ball is in the shop, I don’t know how long I’m going to live.”
City Manager Pro Tem Bill Hoke says those changes have affected several people within the city, but says the community shouldn’t be concerned about the city’s future.
“We have a lot of other people that are not leaving, we have a lot of department heads that are in the not retirement age- or retirement time frame – that will keep doing their job, they won’t miss a beat,” Hoke says.
And Chief George says he has the same confidence.
“The most important thing that you have here is the people that work for you. You gotta train them, and you gotta support them, and give them the tools to be successful and we’ve been fortunate enough to do that,” George says.
Deputy Chief Sparacino will continue to work as interim police chief until a full-time replacement is found by the city council. Meanwhile, the city has hired the search firm Waters Consulting Group to assist in their ongoing search for a permanent city manager. That search could take several months.
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