A message from FPCA's President, Chief Keith Chandler:

November 1, 2000

"Chiefs Seminar"

What do William Beattie of Wauchula, H.C. (Skip) Clark, II of Juno Beach, James Farley of Crystal River, William Guess of Dundee, Mike Loffredo of Jupiter Island, Gerald Monahan of Port Orange, Norm Botsford of Gainesville, Dave Crawford of Cocoa, Roger Free of Virginia Gardens, Brad Hall of Mexico Beach, Brian Mitchell of Havana, Gary Palmer of Lauderhill, Jim Scragg of Cocoa Beach, Sam Slay of Springfield, Anderson Williams of Apalachicola, Dave Shoar of St. Augustine, Wilber Walker, Jr., of Manalapan, and Ronald Wilson of Opa Locka all have in common?

The answer is they’ve all just graduated from our recent New Chief’s Seminar in Tallahassee. Mike Loffredo is writing an article on the class for " Florida Police Chief" magazine, so I’m not going to spend much time talking about it other than to say it’s some of the finest training available for those of us who take chief positions in Florida, and to profile a random selection of participants.

These chiefs and some very soon to be chiefs represent a cross-section of police leadership, most advancing through the ranks of their own agencies to ascend to the top, some coming from other Florida agencies, and others taking their new positions after successful careers in other states.

For example, Gerald Monahan comes to us from Allentown, Pennsylvania, where he served as chief since 1996. He’s 51 years old, single, had twenty-eight years of service with Allentown, and has been Port Orange’s police chief for fourteen months. I was struck by his comment during the class about how professional he’s found Florida Police Chiefs to be, and how he’s impressed with the Florida Police Chiefs Association. Man, I like this guy already if he thinks like that.

Regarding the class, Jerry recently told me: "when I saw the curriculum, I thought ‘I need this.’ It’s extremely important coming from a different law enforcement background. It gave me an opportunity to interact with chiefs as students, and chiefs with significant tenure, the instructors." Jerry went on to say that mutual dialogue during the week he spent with his fellow chiefs was extremely helpful to him it was enlightening and beneficial." He described Friday’s panel discussion on Chiefs Survival as specially deserving of mention (the panel was the Executive Committee of the Association). Jerry described the week as "going by like a flash."

David Shoar, who’s 39, has spent his entire career in St. Augustine (not an altogether depressing thought since it’s one of my favorite places in Florida). He’s served St. Augustine for twenty years, and was appointed chief in May, after serving as Operations Commander. He’s married to Laura, has a ten-year old daughter and seven-year old son.

Dave described the class as being informative, and that it "really provided me with valuable day-to-day hands on information, plus long-range things." He described it as a great seminar, and he’d highly recommend it to others, saying "each Instructor brought a perspective that really helped me out."

Norm Botsford is fifty-five. He came back to Florida after serving as Chief of Police in Columbia, Missouri. He’s held his new position as Gainesville’s chief since October of 1999. He has thirty-five years of law enforcement experience, 27 with the Ft. Lauderdale P.D., retiring as the interim Chief; and four and one-half with the Broward County Sheriffs Office before moving to Missouri. Norm has been married to his wife Mary for thirty-three years, and has three sons, Bruce, Dean and Scott. He say’s he enjoyed the seminar greatly.

Please take the time to call these recent graduates, and congratulate them on that graduation as well as their appointments as Chief. I found them to be interesting, informative, and resourceful in addressing the things we discussed in class. I’m sure they’d appreciate hearing from you welcoming them into our fold.