Fayetteville residents weigh in on search for new police chief

Fayetteville resident Angela Tatum Malloy has a video she’d like to show the city’s new police chief.

Malloy and seven other Fayetteville residents attended a meeting Friday morning at the Kiwanis Recreation Center to provide input about what they’d like to see in a new police chief. The current chief, Gina Hawkins, is retiring in January.

The city has engaged Chapel Hill-based Developmental Associates to assist with the search.

Kerr Putney, former police chief for Charlotte-Mecklenburg, represented the firm, which held Friday’s session to gain input from the community about what qualities and characteristics they want in the next chief.

Putney said the community engagement session will help with advertising the position.

Without providing a specific timeline, he said applications will have a written assessment and emotional and intelligence assessment, before phone interviews.

New police chief:Fayetteville Police Chief Gina Hawkins says she's retiring in January

The final phase of the search will be making the top five recommendations for the city manager to consider, Putney said.

Residents who attended Friday’s meeting told Putney about challenges and opportunities the new police chief will face, priorities the chief should have and an example of a critical case the new chief should know about.

'You have to have a full understanding of what's going on'

The video Malloy said she thinks the new chief should see, was taken shortly after a fence was placed around the Market House in downtown Fayetteville following a riot and fire there that came on the heels of peaceful demonstrations protesting the May 2020 killing of George Floyd. Floyd, a native of the city, was killed while in police custody in Minnesota.

The Market House is the site where enslaved people were previously auctioned in Fayetteville.

Malloy said that in the days after the protests, white Fayetteville police officers detained two Black men suspected of painting the fence around the Market House red.

The white officers, Malloy said, raised their voices, turned red in the face and were aggressive in questioning the men.

“There was a young Black child standing with their mother and (he) started crying and getting afraid,” she said.

Malloy said that after one officer realized she was recording the interaction, his demeanor changed.

She said that after the exchange when she spoke to him, he told her didn’t know what “got into” him.

Malloy said she told the officer that the aggressive interaction she witnessed was what a lot of Black residents experience and that she does not believe the behavior was a one-time thing for the officer.

She said that behavior is why she thinks officers need in-depth cultural competency training that differs from racial equity, diversity and inclusion training.

“You have to have a full understanding what’s going on internally within yourself and then how to deal with that,” Malloy said. “Because we’re not going to assume that we’re going to get all officers that never had any kind of racial biases whatsoever.”

Malloy said she thinks systemic racism is not an issue exclusive to law enforcement and said it exists in education, healthcare and other systems.

“If we don’t deal with the system that we’re placing these people in, we’re going to continue with where we’re at,” she said.

Understanding race relations

Malloy isn’t the only resident who told the consultant they hope Fayetteville's next police chief understands the dynamics of race relations in the city.

Chilleko Hurst said Fayetteville “falls into a trap,” similar to other cities.

During the Floyd protests, Hurst said, someone authorized the National Guard to have a presence.

The Guard, Hurst said, was armed while residents peacefully protested.

Hurst said Maj. Darry Whitaker was the only officer who intervened.

“We need individuals like that,” Hurst said. ‘I know that he’s retired, but I’d love for him to come back.”

Hurst, who is originally from New Orleans, said it reminded him of how Black displaced New Orleans residents were treated after Hurricane Katrina.

Future justice:What Fayetteville families who lost loved ones to officer shootings are asking city officials

In a more recent incident outside of Fayetteville City Hall on Monday night, Hurst said, he and another resident were detained and handcuffed for protesting cases of officers shooting unarmed Black residents.

Hurst said a female sergeant made the call to take the handcuffs off and issue a citation. He said that he and the other protester weren’t causing problems.

“She made a judgment call with her moral compass,” he said. “She did her job, and unfortunately those people are not at the head of law enforcement in this country.”

Hurst said he’d like to see Fayetteville’s new police chief have a similar “moral compass,” while also having integrity and being transparent with residents.

Fayetteville resident Rob Walls agreed a new chief should be “forthright” and transparent.

While a few residents said they’d like to see the new chief be someone already from Fayetteville, Malloy said she is somewhere in between views.

Malloy said she thinks Hawkins attempted to “build the community,” but faced the challenge of not being originally from the area.

Another speaker, Michele Lindo, said she has worked in the city’s community development department for the past 23 years and worked as a New York City police officer prior to that. Lindo said she’s not had an issue with the majority of the chiefs she’s worked with in Fayetteville.

The current challenge, Lindo said, is retention and police officers leaving.

Toni Morris is a local licensed mental health professional.  Morris said she thinks Hawkins also did a great job of trying to build the community.

She said she thinks officers shouldn’t be expected to take on the job of a mental health professional and that some of the issues officers face should be addressed at the state level.

Decreasing crime, recruiting more officers and training officers to see people as individuals and not their “color” are all matters Morris said the new chief will take on.  She said she thinks a top priority for the new chief is bringing the community back together and addressing recruitment in the department.

More:How does crime in Fayetteville this year compare to crime last year?

Rachelle Myles, who has been a lifelong Fayetteville resident and is plugged into faith forums, said she thinks the new chief should be someone who sees the role as more than “just a job.”

“I feel like they really have to have the heart that they want to serve and aren’t just doing their job or seeing this as a stepping stone in their career,” Myles said.

Staff writer Rachael Riley can be reached at rriley@fayobserver.com or 910-486-3528.

This article originally appeared on The Fayetteville Observer: Fayetteville residents on what they want from a new police chief