CBT View: Watkins should pick proven leader as police chief, Tom Dresner

When it comes to selecting a new chief of police for the city, why go outside Columbia and make a selection from a group of four unknowns when the best candidate is already on the job?

Let’s strip the word “interim” from Tom Dresner’s title and make him our new police chief.

On the job since last July when Randy Boehm retired, Dresner has proved that he has the leadership skills and judgment it takes to lead the department.

Dresner has been with the city’s police force for 25 years and most recently was the commander of the administrative support division and in charge of the SWAT team.

Dresner is a graduate of the Missouri School of Journalism, and his greatest tout is communication. Reaching out across the community, venturing where predecessors rarely visited, while tackling controversies head on, Dresner has turned out to be a good listener as well as a forthright communicator with the necessary management skills.

At the start of a CBT Power Lunch forum addressing Columbia’s crime problems, Dresner made a straightforward admission, “Your police department hasn’t done a good job in talking to you.”

Under Dresner, the department created a professional standards unit and a more transparent system for dealing with complaints, set up a street crimes unit focusing on “career criminals” and began putting together a strategic plan that included public input gathered from questionnaires. Dresner called the department’s new system for handling complaints one of the most transparent in the country.

Watkins could choose Dresner if he decides none of the four outside candidates have the mettle to lead the department.

Watkins is understandably skittish about the situation. At least one council member is nipping at the process, scornful of the city manager’s charter-granted exclusive power to pick the police chief. Activists of many stripes continue their push for a civilian police review board that many in the community believe to be superfluous while the continuing controversy over the use of Tasers will face whomever is selected to lead the department.

During a recent KFRU interview, Watkins said he was very pleased with Dresner’s stewardship of the department, and they worked well together. But Dresner agreed not to be a candidate when he took the interim assignment, and Watkins reiterated that he was not a candidate for the chief’s position. But that could-and should-change.

The field of four outsiders will be narrowed down to two, leading Watkins into further investigation, visits to the communities where the candidates serve and huddles with the consultant and the local advisory group.

In 2000 when he was city manager, Ray Beck chose Boehm to lead the police department after the Pennsylvania-based chief originally named to the position decided he didn’t want to move.

One of the original five candidates has dropped out and another, the police chief of a small town in Texas, recently applied to become chief in two larger Texas cities. Another candidate recently resigned as police chief in a small Texas town for what he called political reasons. None of the four stands out as an obvious choice.

Watkins could choose Dresner if he decides none of the outside candidates has the mettle to lead the department, and that’s the pick he should make.