City of Ithaca
Chief of Police Search Process
Guest Opinion
An Invitation To The Ithaca Community
Ithaca Journal
November 16, 1996
These days, one of the most important decisions local government
can make is the selection of a Chief of Police. The police department
touches our lives in numerous ways as it addresses the most critical
issues of crime and safety that our community faces. The Chief
is the key person in the department responsible for assuring that
the police department is run efficiently and effectively while
being responsive to the needs of the community.
Mayor Cohen and Common Council have agreed upon the process for
selecting the next Chief for the City of Ithaca. The process gets
underway next week when all members of the Ithaca community are
invited to attend a public Community Forum on Monday, November
18, at 7:30 p.m. at the Beverly J. Martin School, 302 West Buffalo
Street. At that meeting, everyone will have an opportunity to
discuss the selection of the next Chief and to generate brainstormed
statements that complete the following focus statement:
One specific characteristic I would like to see in the next
Chief of Police is...
If you are interested in participating, please try to attend this
important community meeting. Child care will be provided.
If you are unable to attend the meeting, there are four other ways you can participate in this initial phase of the process:
- Call the toll-free hotline that the city has set up to receive your opinions anonymously at 1-800-386-7734 (no later than Wednesday, November 20th, 5 p.m.).
- Use the cut-out page distributed in the Ithaca Journal, or a separate piece of paper, complete the focus statement above (you may have as many statements as you wish), and mail to Concept Systems Inc., 118 Prospect St., Suite 309, Ithaca, NY 14850 (must be postmarked no later than Wednesday, November 20th).
- Use the cut-out page distributed in the Ithaca Journal, or a separate piece of paper, complete the focus statement above (you may have as many statements as you wish), and drop it in a drop box at one of the following locations: The Greater Ithaca Activities Center (GIAC), Titus Towers, Northside Community Center, Southside Community Center or City Hall. (must be dropped off by Wednesday, November 20th).
- Enter your statements directly on the World Wide Web. If
you don't personally have web access, you can get access to the
web at the Tompkins County Public Library. The address you should
point to is
http://trochim.human.cornell.edu/
From that address, just follow the link to the Ithaca Police Chief Search page and follow the instructions provided.
Please note that all participation is voluntary and that you will
not be asked to supply your name or any personal identifying
information when using the toll-free number, the mail-in/drop-off
form or the website.
What happens after next week's community forum? The Mayor
and project Start-up committee (which consisted of the Mayor,
four Common Council members, former Mayor Guttenberger, and Acting
Police Chief Barnes) are in the process of recruiting a Screening
Committee of twelve people that will oversee activities in the
next few months. This committee was selected to be representative
of the diverse Ithaca community and will be responsible for: developing
the final job announcement; working with the project team to organize
and interpret the results of the community forums; reviewing applicants
and selecting those who will be invited for interviews; reviewing
community interview evaluations of candidates; and, recommending
three final candidates to the Mayor. Representatives of the City
will then visit the home communities of the final candidates,
and the Mayor will make a final decision and communicate that
decision to the entire community. The plan is to reach the final
decision sometime in late March of 1997.
How can you be involved? In addition to the first community
forum next Monday, there will be two other community forums.
The second will take place on Tuesday, December 10th, also at
Beverly J. Martin Elementary School, and will allow participants
to organize and rate the importance of the characteristics you
would like to see in the next Chief. The third forum, to be held
in Mid-January at a still-to-be decided location, will allow the
community to view the results of their efforts and their implications
for the selection process. Sometime in February, we will be bringing
in candidates for interviews and setting up public presentations
so you will have an opportunity to talk to the candidates and
evaluate them based on the community criteria developed in the
three public meetings.
This project is a splendid opportunity for all of us to learn
more about community decision-making, for the university and the
city to pool resources and collaborate on an important community
decision, for the City to save considerable revenue over hiring
an outside consultant, and for the Ithaca community to benefit
in a direct way from the world-class academic institutions in
this area and the state-of-the-art methods and technologies they
are developing.
I encourage everyone in the Ithaca community to participate actively
in this effort. I think you will find the process interesting
and I know your involvement will lead to a better decision for
the whole community.
William Trochim is a Full Professor in the College of Human Ecology
at Cornell University. Mayor Cohen and Common Council asked him
to facilitate the selection process for the next Chief using methods
he has developed over the past fourteen years and has used to
help government, nonprofit and business organizations worldwide
make better decisions.
Return To Main Page
This project is sponsored in part by:
Concept Systems Incorporated |
 |