Two weeks after Mayor Ed Gainey said his announcement of a new police chief was imminent — and one week after sources confirmed the finalists included a former chief from Idaho — some in the community remain leery of bringing in an outsider who they believe comes with too much high-profile baggage.
Mr. Gainey said late last week that no choice had been made, and he tried to dispel rumors that the job has already been offered to former Boise police Chief Ryan Lee. He denied that any offer had been made to any candidate, according to Post-Gazette news partner KDKA-TV, though he said all finalists are “great candidates” who were all “above an A.”
The other finalists are Jason Lando, who spent more than two decades with Pittsburgh Police and is the current chief in Frederick, Md., and Larry Scirotto, who was an assistant chief in Pittsburgh and most recently led the Fort Lauderdale, Fla., department. He was fired for allegedly favoring non-white candidates for promotions.
The mayor said in an April 4 interview with WESA that he’d announce the city’s next chief “within two weeks.” Tuesday marks the start of the second week in that timeline.
Former Boise Chief Lee’s name being in the mix has some concerned regarding his conduct in Idaho, including accusations he broke another officer’s neck during a training exercise. A report from a Boise television station also alleged nearly two dozen officers had filed complaints against Lee before he was asked to resign.
Dr. Staci Ford, a psychologist and community leader in Pittsburgh’s East End, said the idea of bringing in someone with any hint of a violent background could erode any trust that’s been established between the police and the communities in which they work.
“It’s very frustrating — how is that going to build any kind of community trust?” she said. “Bringing somebody in that has a violent past, that’s not appropriate. It will damage the headway that we have made with the community.”
Tim Stevens, president and chief executive of the Black Political Empowerment Project, pointed to the fact that Mr. Gainey campaigned on a platform that centered heavily on criminal justice and policing.
He said his hope is that the administration will choose a chief who prioritizes a “sustained, long-lasting positive relationship with the community” and continues to work on creating and maintaining trust.
“I would also hope and expect,” he said, “the administration would do all of its due diligence in not bringing in someone who could, from Day 1, create a possible basis for the absence of either great support or the absence of great expectations.”
The search process for a new chief has stretched for nearly a year — former Chief Scott Schubert announced his impending retirement in late May, and his last day in uniform was July 1. Mr. Gainey’s administration has consistently said the process was too important to rush.
“I’m extremely frustrated with the whole process,” Dr. Ford said. She questioned the interview process that included meetings between candidates and three separate panels: the mayor’s executive team, police union leadership, and one comprised of community members.
All of those involved in that process have signed a nondisclosure agreement.
If Mr. Lee is offered the position and accepts it, he would be one of just a few leadership hires from outside the department, though the Rev. Darryl Canady, of the Rodman Street Missionary Baptist Church, said an outsider shouldn’t necessarily be a deal-breaker on its own.
“Sometimes you need outsiders to come in with a different lens,” he said.
Former Chief Cameron McLay, hired by then-Mayor Bill Peduto in 2014, was the first chief hired from outside the department in more than 150 years. He resigned in late 2016, saying he’d “accomplished what I can here,” though before his resignation he’d been the target of a no-confidence vote and never did find much common ground with police union leadership and the rank and file.
Rev. Canady said Pittsburgh sometimes gives off the air that outsiders aren’t particularly welcome. As an outsider himself, he said, he doesn’t subscribe to that notion.
Whoever the pick for police chief is, he said, must be committed to community policing and community involvement.
“You have to have the police involved at the community level, not just a bureaucratic [level],” he said, noting that he had great success when it came to community involvement with chiefs McLay and Schubert and Chief Lando.
Dr. Ford pointed to Chief Lando as someone she feels can build upon that involvement and those relationships.
“His is community. He is police reform,” she said. “If we’re trying to rebuild, we need someone who is of community.”
During Chief Lando’s two decades policing in Pittsburgh, he rose to commander of the Zone 5 station in the East End and ran the bureau’s narcotics and vice unit.
In Pittsburgh, he was lauded for his work to improve police-community relations, praise that carried over to Maryland, with Mayor Michael O’Connor last year calling Chief Lando’s work outstanding.
Mr. Scirotto was an assistant chief in Pittsburgh until he retired from the bureau in 2018. Before that, he’d been a finalist to lead the Portland, Ore., police department. He started in Fort Lauderdale in August 2020.
At the time, city leaders pointed to his 23-year history in Pittsburgh, where he reorganized the violent crime unit to prioritize crimes against people.
He served for about six months before he was fired for his alleged focus on hiring and promoting minority candidates.
Mr. Scirotto told CNN in the aftermath of his firing that he’d promoted 15 people from August to November 2021, six of whom were ethnic or gender minorities. He said they were promoted based on merit.
He sued the city last month, claiming he was wrongfully terminated, according to NBC6 in Florida.
Mr. Lee was with the Portland Police Department for nearly 20 years where he became known for his research and expertise in crowd control tactics, including working with protest groups and encouraging them to self-police violent protestors.
He took over the Boise department in 2020 and came under scrutiny in October 2021 when he injured another officer during an impromptu demonstration of hold techniques at a staff meeting. No charges were filed, according to the Idaho Statesman. Prosecutors believed they had enough evidence to charge the chief but not enough to prove a charge beyond a reasonable doubt.
Less than a month after the prosecutors declined to file charges, KTVB reported at least nine officers had filed complaints against the chief just in the spring of 2022. A day after the TV station aired the story, the mayor asked Mr. Lee to resign, according to the Spokesman-Review.
First Published: April 17, 2023, 9:29 p.m.
Updated: April 18, 2023, 1:24 p.m.
