Members ask for inclusion on next chief hire
The Haines Borough’s Public Safety Commission is seeking more involvement in the municipality’s hiring of its next police chief after being effectively ignored during last year’s process, according to commission chair Jim Stanford.
The commission was initially excluded from the hiring process when it was headed by former manager Mark Earnest. When interim manager Julie Cozzi took over and recommended hiring chief Bill Musser, the commission voted against it.
“This is probably one of the most important positions — if not the most important position — in the Haines Borough,” Stanford said. “The guy has more power than anybody in government. I was really appalled that some kind of a process wasn’t followed.”
Two points have brought the issue forward, Stanford said: The borough has found itself back where it was a little more than a year ago, searching for a new chief after Musser’s resignation in March, and the commission is currently preparing a report to the assembly about the body’s effectiveness. The borough resurrected the group about two years ago.
According to code, one of the commission’s duties is to review police chief applications and make a recommendation to the manager. The manager isn’t required to follow the commission’s recommendation, however.
Stanford said he would like the borough to hold one or two public meetings to get community input on what “type of person that they would like in the chief’s job.” Commission chair Judy Erekson suggested contacting the Petersburg Police Department and asking who their final candidates were during their last hiring process.
“Those are people that are already interested in coming to Southeast Alaska,” Erekson said.
Manager David Sosa has decided to hire an interim chief to fill in for up to six months to give Sosa and a hiring committee time to conduct a thorough process that involves the commission.
Sosa said with interim positions he looks for someone with ample experience, making them easier to quickly vet.
“You have their experience, which helps you buy the time to do a more detailed search for someone who may have less experience, may not have served as a chief, maybe who was a sergeant or lieutenant in a larger department,” Sosa said.
Sosa said he has “reached out” to several head-hunting companies and ballparked the figure for services at $40,000. Instead of hiring a completely new firm, Sosa is looking at contracting with Russell Consulting LLC, the Soldotna-based company currently conducting a $22,000 study of the police department.
“The first step in (the headhunting process) is normally a visit to the community where they interview about 20-30 people, so we’ve already had that done,” Sosa said. “I did chat with Mr. Russell and one of the things we discussed was kind of meeting half way on this. He’s already done the interviews and he has been to our community, and so he has an understanding of our requirements and our backgrounds.”
Any negotiations with Russell would be worked out as a contract separate to the police department study, Sosa said.
Sosa said Russell has already been helping the borough by contacting individuals he knows who might be interested in the interim police chief opening. Russell has also been helping craft the job advertisements, Sosa said.
“He learned a lot about the community and he wants us to get the right person,” Sosa said.
The interim position is currently posted on the borough website.
Sosa is adopting the same interim strategy with the public facilities director position, which Carlos Jimenez resigned from in late March.